Americans consider using campaign money for personal legal issues and ignoring subpoenas the worst actions a president could take, a new survey found.
The YouGov survey included 26 potential presidential actions and asked Americans if they were acceptable or unacceptable to them.
Seventy-eight percent of Americans believe that using campaign funds for personal legal disputes is unacceptable behavior for a president. In comparison, 69 percent feel the same way about refusing to respond to subpoenas.
Other presidential actions that Americans find unacceptable include attempting to serve more than the allowed number of terms (68 percent), pressuring the Department of Justice to probe political rivals (67 percent), and using federal funding as a tool for political gain (66 percent).
The presidential actions that are least commonly viewed as inappropriate include making significant policy announcements via social media, with only 40 percent of people finding it unacceptable. Holding official meetings at their own venues is deemed unacceptable by 41 percent, while 42 percent believe that using social media for official communications is unacceptable.
There is a significant divide between Democrats and Republicans regarding what they deem inappropriate behavior for a president.
Democrats tend to disapprove of nearly all the actions mentioned in the survey more than Republicans do.
Over 80 percent of Democrats view it as unacceptable for presidents to utilize federal funds for political gain, restrict press access during significant events, or appoint relatives to high-ranking government roles.
But, less than half of Republicans consider any of these actions unacceptable.
The most pronounced partisan difference is about halting the distribution of federal grants and loans, a measure recently implemented by the Trump administration. Eighty-four percent of Democrats see this move as unacceptable, whereas only 18 percent of Republicans feel the same way.
The poll further says Republicans are more likely than Democrats to support reevaluating official recommendations for widely used vaccines, but this support is not overwhelming.
About 4 in 10 Republicans support such proposals, compared with about 2 in 10 Democrats.
The survey of 2,167 respondents, taken separately from Jan. 28-Feb. 3 and then from Jan. 29-Feb. 1, has a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percent.
