Americans broadly understand that President Trump is making sweeping changes to how the government works, with 81% calling the shifts “major” in a new CBS News/YouGov poll. But the public is far more divided over whether Trump’s changes represent improvements and whether Elon Musk’s DOGE will be beneficial — and far from satisfied with Trump’s priorities in office.
Overall, the poll finds that 51% of American adults approve of the job Trump is doing, while 49% disapprove. But of the poll respondents who said that Trump is making major changes to government, 40% said those changes are for the worse, compared to 35% who say they are for the better and 25% who think it’s too soon to say.
The country appears sharply divided over DOGE and its efforts to slash the government workforce. About eight in 10 people say they have heard or read at least some about DOGE, and 52% say that Musk and DOGE have too much influence over firings and too much access to data records. More than half the country says the DOGE workforce cuts will reduce essential workers and decrease government services, but 65% say that the cuts will remove workers in unnecessary jobs and 53% think they will save taxpayer money.
Of course, views of Trump’s changes and DOGE cuts are split along party lines: 87% of Republicans approve of efforts to slash federal staffing, while 86% of Democrats disapprove. Independents are split, 50-50, on the issue. And 86% of Republicans say DOGE cuts to the federal workforce will make federal agencies work better, compared to 83% of Democrats who say they will not.
The poll also finds that 82% of Americans want Trump to place a high priority on the economy and 80% say the same of inflation. Just 30% say tariffs should be a top priority. But just 36% say that Trump is placing “a lot” of emphasis on the economy, 29% say he is focusing a lot on inflation and 68% say he is prioritizing tariffs. More than half of respondents, 52%, said that they think Trump’s policies are making the cost of food and groceries rise and 54% say they disapprove of how the president is handling inflation.
The pollsters interviewed 2,311 U.S. adults between February 26 and 28. The poll’s margin of error is plus or minus 2.5 points. Read more at CBS News.