What you need to know about the Fox News poll that angered Trump: From Ukraine call to president being removed

Results show that the president's behaviour has proved troubling even for members of his party

President Trump insulted the polling company responsible in an early morning tweet (AP)

For not the first time in recent weeks, President Donald Trump woke up angry. At least based on his early morning, executive-time tweeting.

Mr Trump is facing pressure from an impeachment inquiry in the Democratic-controlled House of Representatives, stemming from his efforts to get Ukraine to investigate former vice president Joe Biden, a possible opponent for Mr Trump in next year's general election. Polling has shown a recent increase in support for that inquiry following a cascade of revelations about how the administration and Mr Trump's outside lawyer tried to dig up dirt on Mr Biden and his son Hunter.

What had Mr Trump particularly incensed on Thursday morning was a new poll from a cable network that's generally generous in its estimations of his presidency.

“From the day I announced I was running for President, I have NEVER had a good @FoxNews Poll. Whoever their Pollster is, they suck,” Mr Trump tweeted. “But @FoxNews is also much different than it used to be in the good old days.”

It's not true that Mr Trump has never had a good poll from Fox's pollsters; in January 2016, he celebrated a Fox poll that showed him leading in the Iowa caucuses. Nor is it the case that Fox's poll team generally mirrors the network's coverage. The pollsters represent the sort of objective analysis that the network's pundits only claim to espouse.

That said, it's not surprising that Mr Trump is particularly angry about the new results.

1. The poll shows that a majority of Americans want to see Mr Trump removed from office.

The top-line numbers are some of the worst Mr Trump has seen on the question of impeachment and removal from office. In the Fox News poll, 51% of respondents said that Trump should be both impeached and removed, with 4% saying he should be impeached but not removed.

Among suburban women, a constituency that is of ongoing concern for Republicans, nearly six in 10 support Mr Trump's removal. Even more than one in 10 Republicans - and 12% of people who voted for Mr Trump - think he should be ousted.

More than half of respondents said they thought Mr Trump is more focused on doing what serves himself best as opposed to what best serves the country. Nearly a fifth of Republicans said that they think Mr Trump is focused more on Mr Trump than the country.

2. Americans find Mr Trump's actions on Ukraine particularly troubling.

Asked their views about what Mr Trump did - specifically, asking Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky to investigate Mr Biden - most respondents said that the request was “very” or “extremely” troubling. Even a fifth of Republicans said it was at least “very” troubling that Mr Trump made the request.

Mr Trump and his allies have been arguing that the request was solely a function of Mr Trump's desire to see possible corruption uprooted. It's an argument that suffers from two distinct problems: There's not strong evidence that Mr Biden was engaged in anything close to corruption, and there's no evidence that Mr Trump has put a focus on corruption anywhere that a prominent Democrat wasn't involved.

That argument appears to have gained traction. Fully 40% of Republicans think it's inappropriate for Mr Trump to ask foreign leaders to investigate political rivals - nearly twice as many as find the Ukraine situation troubling. This suggests, perhaps, that some supporters accept the idea that Mr Trump wasn't looking to undermine Mr Biden specifically.

But the numbers above are grim for Mr Trump as an impeachment inquiry moves forward. Unearthing additional evidence suggesting that Mr Trump's goal was solely to undercut Mr Biden could presumably increase the number of people who consider Mr Trump's actions out of bound. (Assuming the normal rules of political scandal apply, which may not be a fair assumption.)

3. Views of the situation among Republicans are complicated.

Thirteen per cent of Republicans believe that Mr Trump should be impeached and removed from office. That's a big chunk of the president's own party - 1 in 8 Republicans. But it's not many relative to the population overall.

Fox's pollsters asked those Republicans why they didn't think Mr Trump should be impeached.

- 22% of those who opposed impeachment said Mr Trump did nothing wrong.

- 22% said the impeachment push was a politically motivated attack.

- 17% said there was a lack of evidence.

- 12% said they approve of the job he's doing.

- 10% said that what Mr Trump did wasn't impeachable.

That 17% is interesting, implying (as we just noted) that more evidence might sway them. As it stands, 9% of Republicans see the Ukraine call as impeachable, with another 38% calling it inappropriate.

There's a broad sense that this is political. Eighty-one per cent of Republicans think Democrats just want to hurt Mr Trump politically. About six in 10 Republicans think that Republicans in Congress oppose impeachment because they think Mr Trump did nothing wrong.

The flip sides of those questions are interesting, too. Only 11% of Republicans think that Democrats sincerely think Mr Trump did something impeachable. But about a quarter of Republicans think that members of their party are opposing impeachment to protect the president.

4. There remains a significant gender gap in views of what happened.

On the questions of both approval of Mr Trump's job performance and impeachment, there are big gaps between men and women. Men are 13 points more likely to approve of Mr Trump's job performance; women are 13 points more likely to want to see him booted from office.

Some of the broadest gaps are among white people with college degrees. More than half of white men with degrees approve of Mr Trump's job performance while only about a third of white women with degrees do, a 20-point gap. White women with degrees are 14 points more likely to want to see Mr Trump impeached and removed.

5. Fox News has covered its poll less than other networks.

One small detail that should relieve Mr Trump: His favourite network is talking about the results of the poll less than other networks.

A search of mentions of either “Fox News poll” or “51 per cent” since the poll was released Thursday evening shows that Fox News and Fox Business have mentioned it less frequently than CNN or MSNBC, particularly when including overnight reruns of shows.

When Fox News does cover the poll, its coverage can be a bit different in tone than the other networks.

“Polls are showing support for impeachment,” host Laura Ingraham said. “And the polls are not going in the way the president wants them to go. If you believe the polls, you don't believe the polls - including a poll done by Fox News. A thousand registered voters called randomly on cellphones and home phones. Supposedly 51% say they want the president either impeached or removed.”

“Supposedly.”

“If you believe the polls.”

On Fox & Friends on Thursday morning, a reporter noted that support for impeachment had increased since a July Fox poll. “Since then a lot has happened,” he said, “most notably, of course, the House Democrats launching the impeachment inquiry.”

The last Fox News poll was released 25 July, the day that something else notable happened: that call between Trump and the Ukrainian president.

​The Washington Post