Confidence in Fauci plunges; quarter of Americans say the coronavirus pandemic is over: poll

Americans' confidence in Dr. Anthony Fauci has plunged in the last year, according to a new poll from The Convention of States Action and The Trafalgar Group.

The survey of 1,093 likely general election voters conducted between May 16 and May 18 found that people aren't as enamored with Fauci's handling of the COVID-19 pandemic as they used to be.

The survey asked participants: "Has your confidence in Dr. Fauci gone up or down in the past year?" There were 42.2% of respondents who said their confidence in Fauci has "decreased significantly" or "decreased" in the last year. There were 26.1% who said their opinion of the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases was "unchanged" over the last 12 months.

There were 9.1% of those polled who said their opinion of the member of the White House Coronavirus Task Force "increased," and 13% said their faith in Fauci "increased significantly."

As expected, there was a major difference of opinion of Fauci along party lines. There were 61.1% of Republicans who had their confidence in Fauci "decrease" or "decrease significantly" in the past year. Meanwhile, only 20% of Democrats had their opinion of Fauci "decrease" or "decrease significantly" since last year.

"Since the beginning, Dr. Anthony Fauci has served as the face of, and has set the tone for, Washington's response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Voters are wisely deciding for themselves and ignoring D.C.," Mark Meckler, President of Convention of States Action, a nonprofit that aims to "bring power back to the states and the people," said.

In February, Americans had a very favorable view of Dr. Fauci. A Morning Consult/Politico poll from February found that 60% of respondents said Fauci had handled the coronavirus pandemic "excellent" or "good," while only 17% said he had done a "poor" job at the time.

In another nationwide poll from The Convention of States Action and The Trafalgar Group, there are over a quarter of Americans who believe the coronavirus pandemic is over. The survey of 1,531 likely general election voters conducted between May 14 and May 16 asked, "When will you personally consider the COVID-19 pandemic over and go about life as usual?"

There were 26.4% of Americans who said they would believe the COVID-19 pandemic is over when the federal government and Centers for Disease Control and Prevention tell them the pandemic is over. There were 25.7% who said the coronavirus pandemic is already over. Nearly 20% said the pandemic would be over when everyone has the opportunity to get the coronavirus vaccine. Then there were 11.1% who said they never took the COVID-19 pandemic seriously.