Bush job approval in all public polls taken since 1/20/2005. Red points are post-Katrina. The blue line is the trend in approval of President Bush since January 20, but before Katrina struck. Note there are two post-Katrina polls at 42% taken 1 day apart, so the two points are easily mistaken for one.
President Bush's approval ratings continued to decline in new polls taken towards the end of last week. The AP/Ipsos poll found an approval rating of 39% in interviews taken 9/6-8. Time/SRBI recorded a 42% approval over 9/7-8, while Newsweek/PSRA found a 38% approval level in its 9/8-9 survey.
In all three cases, the approval ratings are the lowest ever recorded for President Bush by the particular poll.
The direct impact of Hurricane Katrina, as opposed to the general downward trend in President Bush's approval, is not yet statistically precise. I estimate an effect of between -1.2% and -2.o% due to Katrina, after accounting for the general negative trend, and after accounting for differences between polling organizations. However, the number of post-Katrina polls is still not large enough to have great confidence in these estimates.
