Confidence In GOP Is At New Low in Poll

Bush's fading popularity is matched by waning popular support for the Republican-held Congress. A third of the country approves of the job Congress is doing -- identical to the president's poor job performance rating -- and a 10-year low. Even Republicans are divided over the performance of the Republican-controlled Congress: 49 percent approved while 47 disapproved, a view shared by seven in 10 Democrats and political independents.

The survey suggests that dissatisfaction with Congress extends to members of both parties. Only 39 percent approve of the job Democrats in Congress are doing, while 58 percent disapprove -- slightly higher than the level of disapproval registered before the 1994 midterm elections, when Republicans evicted Democrats from power on Capitol Hill.

On one other measure, incumbents look slightly less threatened. More than three in five, 62 percent, said they approve of the way their own representative is doing his or her job, up from 59 percent last month. At this point in 1994, an equal percentage gave good ratings to their representatives, but by October that number had plunged to 49 percent.

A total of 1,103 randomly selected adults were interviewed by telephone May 11-15. Margin of sampling error is plus or minus three percentage points.

Democrats hold an advantage of 52 percent to 40 percent when voters are asked whether they plan to vote for the Republican or Democratic candidate in their House district, a margin that didn't narrow when the preferences of only those most likely to cast ballots were analyzed. That 12-point Democratic margin is slightly smaller than in several previous polls.

The survey also found Democrats had a double-digit lead over Republicans on nine of the 10 issues when respondents were asked which party they favored to deal with the problem and a smaller lead on the 10th.

By 2 to 1 or better, the public preferred Democrats to handle gas prices and health care. And by double-digit margins, they preferred Democrats to deal with education (23 percentage points), the budget (20 points), the economy (18 points) and protecting privacy (15 points). Democrats also had a 14-point edge on handling Iraq, immigration and taxes.

Only on terrorism did Republicans come close -- though, by 46 to 41 percent, the public still preferred the Democrats.

The economy, followed by Iraq and immigration, leads a long and wide-ranging list of issues that voters say are most important to them at the ballot box this year. Among those who say the economy is their top issue -- about 17 percent of the public -- 56 percent say they will vote for the Democratic candidate in House races. Eleven percent named Iraq as their priority, and 79 percent of these plan to vote Democratic.

On one issue, Americans were less pessimistic than a month ago. In April, 70 percent said higher gasoline prices were causing financial hardship. In the latest poll, 57 percent said that was the case.

Assistant polling director Claudia Deane contributed to this report.