Beleaguered Carney Doesn’t Win with Public Either

May 21, 2013, 9:36 PM GMT+0

Republicans dislike White House Press Secretary Jay Carney far more than Democrats like him

With several scandals engulfing the Obama administration in recent weeks, increased attention has been focused on Jay Carney, the White House Press Secretary. While Carney is tasked with presenting the administration’s point of view, he has received increasing criticism in recent weeks for his performance from critics both left and right.

New results from YouGov show that only around a third of Americans have heard of Carney, but among those who have, opinion is extremely negative.

Overall, 38% of Americans have heard of Carney. This is exactly the same the number who had heard of the previous Press Secretary Robert Gibbs, but less than the number who had heard of David Axelrod, a former advisor to the President.

While Carney is a Democrat, Republicans were also nearly twice as likely to have heard of Carney than Democrats.

Among those who had heard of Carney, 25% had a favorable opinion of him and 59% had an unfavorable opinion, including 45% who had a “very unfavorable” opinion. In comparison with the other White House officials and advisors we asked about, Carney was the second worst perceived, with only Valerie Jarrett having a worse net score.

Perception was also skewed heavily along partisan lines. 22% of Democrats had a favorable view of Carney versus 6% who had an unfavorable view. 44% of Republicans on the other hand had an unfavorable view of Carney with only 8% with a favorable impression.