Canadians approve of Trump over Trudeau, think US is heading in ‘right direction’: poll

A new poll from Abacus Data shows that Canadians are more likely to think America is heading in the "right direction" than Canada. The same poll shows that Donald Trump has a higher approval rating among Canadians than Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.

"Today, 24% of Canadians approve of the job performance of the federal government (down 1) while disapproval is steady at 61%," reads the report. "... We are also tracking Canadian impressions of Donald Trump. And since the tariff announcement last week, positive impressions of Trump have increased. Those with a negative impression are down 7 from two weeks ago while those with a positive view are up 6 to 26%, the highest we have measured since we started tracking in September."

Research suggests that despite being slightly more popular than Trudeau, Trump is still unpopular in Canada, and only about half of those with a positive view of Pierre Poilievre have a positive impression of the American president-elect. 

The Liberals continue to trail the Conservatives by over 20 points, with Abacus writing "We’ve seen no change in how people feel about the Prime Minister or the performance of the government. The mood of the country has soured a bit – to the lowest level we have ever measured – and now more Canadians believe the United States is headed in the right direction (23%) than do think that about Canada (22%)."

The survey was conducted with 2,720 Canadian adults from November 29 to December 4, 2024. The margin of error for a comparable probability-based random sample of the same size is +/- 1.9%, 19 times out of 20.