Poll: McCarthy’s Approval Surges, Far Superior to Paul Ryan’s at Same Point in Speakership

House Speaker Kevin McCarthy’s (R-CA) approval and favorability ratings are surging and are far superior to Paul Ryan’s at a similar point in his speakership.

An Economist/YouGov poll published Wednesday shows that McCarthy has an approval rating of 41 percent and a disapproval rating of 34 percent. This marks a net gain of six percentage points since last week’s survey from the pollster. Among Republican voters, McCarthy has a 62 percent approval rating, while just 17 percent disapprove – a net of plus 45 percent.

In comparison, Ryan, the last GOP speaker, had an overall approval rating of 33 percent after his first two months, with a disapproval rating of 30 percent, a YouGov poll from early January 2016 showed. Among Republicans, his approval rating pinged at 45 percent, with 30 percent disapproving. McCarthy is a net 3o percentage points ahead of where Ryan was with GOP voters at a similar point in his speakership.

McCarthy has also enjoyed substantial gains in favorability week-over-week. He currently has a positive favorability rating of 39 percent and 38 percent who disapprove. This marks a net 12-point gain for the speaker. Among Republicans, 63 percent find him favorable, versus just 22 percent who find him unfavorable, signaling a net-17 point gain since last week.

Ryan, at a comparable point, had favorability and unfavorability ratings of 31 percent and 38 percent, respectively. Just 45 percent of Republicans categorized him as favorable, while 39 percent said he was unfavorable. This marked a net of plus six percentage points, which is 35 points behind where McCarthy currently is.

McCarthy’s surge corresponds with Fox News Anchor Tucker Carlson’s airing of January 6 footage last week that the speaker provided him in February. McCarthy reportedly gave Carlson some 41,000 hours of footage – far more than the 14,000 hours figure that was previously reported. He pledged during an exclusive long-form sit-down interview with Breitbart News Washington Bureau Chief Matthew Boyle last week to fully release all of the videos.

“We just want to make sure we go through them all, and it takes time,” he said. “The first thing that Tucker said too, he didn’t want to show any exits to cause any problems. We asked the Capitol Police, ‘Were there any concerns?’ They came back with one, and we mitigated that, but it was interesting, that one that they had a problem with, Eric Swalwell had had up on the Internet for the last two years showing that part.”

Of the respondents, 42 percent say they approve of McCarthy’s decision to give Carson access to the tapes, while 38 percent do not agree with the move. Sixty-one percent of republicans support the speaker’s decision.

The poll sampled 1,500 U.S. adults from March 10-14, and the weighted margin of error is plus or minus 3.2 percentage points.

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