Donald Trump or Vladimir Putin: Who do Indians trust more to handle world affairs? The survey reveals…. | Today’s news
US President Donald Trump’s global approval rating remains weak, with 76% of respondents expressing no confidence in his leadership, according to a new Pew Research Center survey.
A poll released Tuesday showed that only 23% of respondents said they had confidence in Trump’s ability to handle international affairs. According to PTI, the findings also showed that 51% of Indian respondents expressed confidence in Russian President Vladimir Putin’s ability to manage global affairs. Only 39% of Indians said they trust Trump to do the right thing in world affairs, according to the Hindustan Times.
The survey was conducted between February 8 and May 13, 2026, and included responses from 42,151 people in 36 countries.
Declining trust in Trump among Indians
Trust in Trump’s leadership has fallen in 16 of the 24 countries surveyed and is reported to have improved in no country.
In a survey the year before last, 51% of Indian respondents trusted him. It also found that many Indians disagreed with Trump’s approach to global tariffs, his handling of the situation in Venezuela and Iran, and the United States’ restrictive immigration policy. Only 32% supported his immigration policy, while 17% approved of his handling of Venezuela and 28% supported his approach to Iran.
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Indian respondents also expressed limited support for Trump’s decision to end international aid agencies such as the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), as well as his handling of the Gaza war and the Russia-Ukraine conflict.
The findings indicate a decline in Indian perceptions of the United States and end nearly two decades of relatively consistent positive views. In 2005, two years after President George W. Bush launched the widely criticized war in Iraq, the United States had a 71% approval rating in India.
How other nations view the US, Trump
Meanwhile, in Israel, 81% of respondents had a favorable view of the United States, while 66% said they trusted Trump to make the right decisions on global affairs.
The Trump administration’s tariff policy emerged as one of its least popular measures, with only 18% of respondents approving of it. By comparison, 32% viewed the administration’s immigration policy positively.
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Support for Trump’s tariff policy remained low in several countries, with an approval rating of 27% in the United Kingdom, 17% in Canada, 15% in Japan, 14% in South Korea, 11% in Mexico and 8% in Germany.
Kenya was the only country surveyed where a majority (55%) approved of Trump’s handling of the tariffs.
Across all 36 countries surveyed, a median of 32% of adults believed that the United States takes into account the interests of countries like their own either a lot or fairly when making foreign policy decisions.
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Among European countries, France, Germany and Greece recorded some of the lowest levels of trust in Trump, with his ratings often matching those of Putin, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, or both.
In Germany, for example, 16% of respondents said they trusted Trump, while similar shares expressed confidence in Putin (15%) and Netanyahu (15%). Conversely, 72% said they had confidence in French President Emmanuel Macron.
Trump also received particularly low trustworthiness ratings among the majority Muslim population included in the survey. Among Palestinians in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, he was trusted by only 4%, compared to 2% for Netanyahu. In contrast, around four in ten respondents said they trust Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping.
