Russian President Vladimir Putin maintains a higher level of global trust than U.S. President Donald Trump, according to the latest Pew Research Center poll published Tuesday.
Respondents in 13 mainly European countries voiced the highest confidence in German Chancellor Angela Merkel (76%), French President Emmanuel Macron (64%) and British Prime Minister Boris Johnson (48%).
Putin comes in fourth, with 23% of global respondents saying they have confidence that he would “do the right thing regarding world affairs,” according to Pew.
The Russian president is four points ahead of Chinese President Xi Jinping (19%) and seven points ahead of Trump (16%).
In contrast to the European leaders, Pew’s respondents voiced a higher lack of confidence in Putin (73%), Xi (78%) and Trump (83%).
“Ratings for Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping are overwhelmingly negative, although not as negative as those for Trump,” Pew said.
Putin’s trust gap with Trump has widened somewhat from last year, when 33% of Pew respondents from 33 countries expressed confidence in him compared to Trump’s 29%.
Pew conducted the phone survey among 13,273 respondents from nine European countries, Canada, Australia, Japan and South Korea between June 10 and Aug. 3.
