Donald Trump launched his second presidency in the Capitol rotunda in January riding the political high of his 2024 election victory with a promise to deliver a new “golden age” to Americans.

But 100 days later, after a blizzard of actions to gut the federal government and remake the global economy through sweeping tariffs, Trump is back to being the unpopular and polarising president that he was during most of his first term in office. At the 100-day mark he has the lowest approval rating of any president in the past seven decades, according to one poll.

A dissatisfied US public has rapidly soured on Trump’s performance, according to recent polls, amid scepticism of his trade policies, aggressive spending cuts and even some concern that his crackdown on immigration is going too far.