A majority of registered voters disapprove of how President Donald Trump is handling the situation in Iran and believe the U.S. shouldn’t have taken military action against the country, according to a new NBC News poll.
Though support for the White House is mostly polarized along party lines, a small but notable slice of Republicans is unhappy with the decision to launch a war in the Middle East. There was also a significant split between younger and older voters in the early days of the attacks.
Fifty-four percent of voters disapprove of Trump’s handling of Iran, compared with 41% who approve and 5% who say they either don’t have an opinion or aren’t sure. A similar share, 52%, say the U.S. should not have taken the military action, while 41% say it should have and 7% say they aren’t sure.
The poll is an initial snapshot of how American voters are digesting a major new military endeavor launched by a president who campaigned against past “endless wars” when he sought to return to the White House in 2024.
“This is a lower level of support than in most of the major military action that we’ve seen,” said Republican pollster Bill McInturff of Public Opinion Strategies, who conducted the poll with Democratic pollster Jeff Horwitt of Hart Research Associates.
“Attitudes shift in this country based on results,” McInturff added. “Things could get worse if the results are worse, and things can certainly get better if there’s a stable, better outcome here.”
NBC News polling from early 2002 to early 2003 found majorities of Americans saying the U.S. should take military action to remove Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq.
In October 2001, during the early stages of strikes in Afghanistan in response to the 9/11 attacks, 87% said they supported President George W. Bush's approach to the war on terrorism, and a similar percentage approved of the airstrikes against the Taliban in Afghanistan.
In both cases, public opinion flipped over the years, with a clear majority of Americans eventually saying the conflicts weren’t worth it.
The new survey first began testing sentiment about the Iran strikes on Saturday, hours after the U.S. government announced the beginning of its campaign, and it was in the field amid a series of important new developments — including the news that the strikes killed Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, that six U.S. service members were killed, that Iran retaliated by launching strikes on U.S. allies in the region and that Americans are scrambling to get out of the Middle East.
The Trump administration has signaled the strikes will continue to ramp up in the coming days, and more developments could bring additional shifts in public sentiment as Republicans and Democrats in Congress debate the implications and potential results of the U.S.’ undertaking its most significant military action in years.
Trump and his allies have argued that the strikes were essential to protect Americans from “imminent threats,” accusing Iran of seeking a nuclear weapon and saying they were unable to deter it through diplomatic negotiations. Many Democrats in Congress have blasted the move, castigating Trump for what they have framed as a war of choice, not necessity.
The results show clear, if expected, partisan polarization over the issue: An overwhelming majority of Democrats, 89%, say the U.S. shouldn’t have struck Iran. Among independents, 58% agree.
Republicans are overall more supportive of the strikes: 77% say the U.S. should have struck Iran, while 15% disagree. But there’s a significant divide between Republicans who consider themselves aligned with Trump’s Make America Great Again movement and those who don’t.
A full 90% of self-identified MAGA-aligned Republicans back the strikes, with just 5% saying they don’t think they should have been launched. But Republicans who don’t see themselves as part of MAGA are more divided, with 54% supporting the strikes and 36% against them.
Margins of error are larger for these smaller subgroups, but the results still point to significant differences between different parts of the party. Trump framed much of his 2024 presidential campaign around the idea of an “America First” approach to foreign policy deeply critical of past administrations that he claimed thrust the country into endless conflict around the globe. Now, the Republican base is wrestling with the new conflict.
McInturff said the divide within the GOP was an important reminder about both the loyalty of Trump’s base and the part of the party that’s “softer” on him.
“The self-identified MAGA Republicans are incredibly supportive of Trump, and that political base has so far been unshaken — and so far, surely, has been unshaken to date about military action in Iran,” he said.
