US public opinion of China hits new low, Pew Research survey shows

A Pew poll of 1,000 people taken in March found that 66 per cent of respondents held an unfavourable view of China

A majority of Americans said they lacked confidence in Xi to do the right thing

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Surveys by Pew and other major polling organisations have charted a significant rise in American distrust toward China since President Donald Trump came into office. Photo: Reuters

Published: 10:00pm, 21 Apr 2020Updated: 11:20pm, 22 Apr 2020

Americans’ views toward China fell to their lowest level since Pew Research Centre started asking the question in 2005 as respondents’ opinion of President Xi Jinping hit a new low, according to survey results released Tuesday.

The Pew poll of 1,000 people taken last month found that 66 per cent of respondents held an unfavourable view of China, up from 47 per cent in 2017 when President Donald Trump took office. And a large majority of Americans said they lacked confidence in Xi to do the right thing when it came to global affairs, a steep increase since last year.

“It’s hardly surprising,” said Orville Schell, director of Asia Society’s Centre on US-China Relations. “It’s now just about the only thing in Washington that Republicans and Democrats agree on, that we should have a much more sceptical view of China’s intentions.”

Surveys by Pew and other major polling organisations have charted a significant rise in American distrust toward China since President Donald Trump came into office, including a Gallup poll in March that pegged US public opinion at a 20-year low, below even where it was after the 1989 Tiananmen Square crackdown.

But analysts also underscore that trust toward the Asian giant was ebbing even before Trump came to power, launched a massive trade war and stepped up anti-China talk.

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