Since clinching victory in the November election, President Donald Trump has witnessed a noticeable rise in his favorability ratings, despite continuing to polarize the nation. His second term has been characterized by a whirlwind of activity, including bold threats of trade wars with traditional allies, a flurry of executive orders, deportation flights, and cuts to foreign aid.

Even with this uptick in his personal ratings, Trump still holds the distinction of having the lowest favorability ratings for any newly inaugurated president since the metric was first recorded in 1953. According to Real Clear Politics’ average of opinion polls, 48.8 percent of voters currently view Trump favorably, while 47.9 percent hold an unfavorable opinion, giving him a slight net positive of 0.9 points as of Tuesday morning.

This figure marks a slight decrease from the beginning of the month when he enjoyed a net positive of 1.2 points, his highest score to date. Despite this modest improvement, Trump’s overall favorability has been predominantly negative since he entered the political arena in 2015, at times with unfavorable ratings surpassing 30 points. These findings are echoed in a recent DailyMail.com/J.L. Partners poll, which indicates a gradual shift in voter sentiment towards Trump and his policies.

Some 39 percent of respondents, in a poll of 1,009 registered voters just before the inauguration, said they had developed a more positive view of the 78-year-old former property mogul during the past two months. And his favorability rating moved up by three points.

It was perhaps not surprising, given the scale of his win, when he collected all seven battleground states and became the first Republican since George W. Bush (after 9/11) to claim victory in the popular vote. ‘More voters than is usual in our polarized system do seem to have genuinely rallied around him as he was inaugurated and, going by the popularity of his initial acts— especially deportation of illegal migrants – that’s no surprise,’ said J.L. Partners cofounder James Johnson.

‘Enthusiasm for Trump amongst his own voters was also at fever pitch levels during the election, and that is not going to fray straight away.’ But the honeymoon will not last forever, he added. ‘Part of this will be inevitable as the excitement fades and people’s attention moves elsewhere,’ he said. ‘And challenges – as well as unforced errors – plague the modern presidency.’

A tracker maintained by statistic website FiveThirtyEight showed a similar trend, although he has yet to record a net positive rating in its rolling average. The J.L. Partners survey attempted to unpick why voters may have moved towards Trump.

Voters who said they felt more positive about Trump were asked to give a one-word explanation. When the results were plotted in a word cloud, the most common answers were: Country, Trump, America, president.

It suggests he may have benefited from a post-election period when he limited his public appearances and social media commentary, and was seen as acting more presidentially and working for the good of the nation. Those who had a less favorable view cited the countries or territories that he has set his sights on: Canada, Greenland, Panama, and they used the word ‘felon.’

Want more stories like this from the Daily Mail? Visit our profile page and hit the follow button above for more of the news you need.