President Donald Trump’s approval rating fell to 31%, another record low in his political career, while Democrats led Republicans by 12 points on the generic congressional ballot. The Reuters/Ipsos poll found 47% of registered voters preferred a generic Democrat and 35% a generic Republican. Disapproval has increased in recent months, particularly since the February 28 launch of the US-Israel war on Iran, which pushed up petrol and diesel prices and affected the broader economy. Other recent surveys showed similarly weak standing for Trump and his party: an NBC poll found 71% of Americans believed the country was on the wrong track and 55% would vote Democratic, while a Washington Post/ABC/Ipsos poll put Trump’s approval at 33% and found seven in 10 respondents considered petrol or gasoline increasingly unaffordable. The November 3 elections will determine control of the House of Representatives and Senate, although national preference polls do not capture the state-level and district-level contests that decide congressional majorities.