London, 15 Sep – US President Barack Obama’s policy win last week in preventing Congress from blocking the nuclear agreement with Iran will do little to improve his sagging approval ratings amongst the American people.
A new CNN/ORC poll finds 59% of Americans disapprove of the way Obama is handling the U.S. relationship with Iran, and about half would have preferred Congress reject the deal. Few believe Iran will abide by its terms, and a growing number consider the country a serious threat to the US.
Most Americans think Iran will ultimately violate the terms of the agreement, with 37% calling that extremely likely and 23% saying very likely. Just 10% think it’s not at all likely that Iran would break the agreement. Republicans (83% likely) and independents (58% likely) are more apt to believe Iran would violate the agreement than are Democrats (44% likely).
If Iran did violate the deal, 64% of all adults say the United States should respond with military action, including majorities across party lines (57% of Democrats, 64% of independents and 72% of Republicans). About a third, 34%, say the United States should not take military action if the deal is broken.
Perceptions of threats from North Korea, Russia and Iran have all grown since April, but the biggest increase lies with Iran.
Nearly half (49%) now say they consider Iran a ‘very serious’ threat to the United States, up 10 points since April. That shift came across party lines with double-digit increases in the percentage viewing Iran as a very serious threat among both Democrats (up 14 points to 43%) and Republicans (up 15 points to 68%).
The CNN/ORC poll was conducted by telephone 4-8 September among a random national sample of 1,012 adults. Results for the full sample have a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.
