52% of Republicans disapprove of Mitch McConnell as Trump ramps up his pressure campaign to topple him: poll

• A new poll found that most Republicans disapprove of the job Sen. Mitch McConnell is doing.
• The Senate minority leader had a lower overall approval rating than Kamala Harris and Joe Biden.

A new Gallup poll found that 52% of Republicans disapproved of the job that Mitch McConnell was doing as Senate minority leader as former President Donald Trump continued to call for the Kentucky Republican's ouster.

Meanwhile, 46% of Republicans said they approved of McConnell — a dismal approval rating in comparison to the 71% approval rating by the same group for his counterpart in the other chamber, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy.

The poll asked voters about 11 major political figures, which included President Joe Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris, congressional leaders, Dr. Anthony Fauci, and Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts.

Roberts had the highest job-approval rating out of all the figures polled, with 60% overall — including 57% of Republicans and 55% of Democrats — while McConnell had the lowest: 34% overall.

McConnell also fared poorly in comparison to other congressional leaders: 40% of voters overall said they approved of the job done by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, while 44% said the same of Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer. McCarthy's overall approval was 46%.

Still, McConnell's approval among Republicans was slightly better in the Gallup poll than in others. A recent The Economist/YouGov poll registered McConnell's Republican approval at 31%, while a Morning Consult/Politico poll found that 40% of Republicans approved of the minority leader's job performance.

And McConnell's approval among Republicans has apparently ticked upward from a low in February.

The Gallup poll included 811 adults, was conducted from December 1 through 16, and had a 4 percentage point margin of error.

'What is wrong with this Broken Old Crow?'

For months now, former President Donald Trump has sought to topple McConnell as leader of the Senate Republican Caucus.

Frequently referring to McConnell as an "old crow," Trump has criticized the Kentucky Republican for not sufficiently indulging his claims of a stolen 2020 election, for helping to pass a bipartisan infrastructure bill, and for cutting deals with Democrats to raise the debt ceiling.

"What is wrong with this Broken Old Crow?" Trump said in a December 12 statement. "He's hurting the Republican Senators and the Republican Party. When will they vote him out of Leadership?"

The two haven't spoken since before the January 6 storming of the US Capitol, and McConnell denounced Trump as "practically and morally responsible" for the attack even as he announced that he wouldn't vote to impeach the former president in the Senate trial after Trump had left office.

Trump has harshly criticized McConnell for cutting deals with Senate Democrats to raise the debt ceiling, though Senate Republicans have largely shrugged off his remarks.

The former president also said that a bipartisan infrastructure bill that was supported by 19 Republican senators paved the way for the Democrats' Build Back Better climate and social spending bill, which remains stalled amid opposition from Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin of West Virginia.

"Those 19 Republicans, including the Broken Old Crow, should not be forgotten for what they have done and the absolutely horrible ramifications this Bill will have on the future of our Nation," Trump said in a December 7 statement.

McConnell has also recently expressed interest in the workings of the January 6 committee in the House, saying in a recent interview that the committee's findings are "something the public needs to know."

Trump, meanwhile, has repeatedly denounced the committee as the "Unselect Committee" and cast its efforts as part of a partisan witch hunt against him.

"Remember, the insurrection took place on November 3rd," the former president said in a December 21 statement, referring to the date of the 2020 election that he continues to say was stolen from him despite no evidence of widespread voter fraud.