Support Numbers Remain Dismal for Kishida in July

Low Expectations on the Policy Front

In the monthly public opinion polls carried out by eight key media organizations in Japan, Prime Minister Kishida Fumio saw his fortunes rise slightly in July from a month earlier, with six of the polls indicating a 2–4 percentage point climb in support rates for his administration. This still left his support below the 30% mark in all eight polls, though. Even the Sankei Shimbun poll, the only one to indicate support north of 30% in June, saw a 6.1-point fall to bring the support rate down to around 25%.

In the Mainichi Shimbun survey, support for the prime minister climbed above the 20% mark for the first time in two months. However, the Jiji Press poll saw a support rate of just 15.5%, a fall of 0.9 point from the June survey, which in turn had been a record low since the Liberal Democratic Party returned to power in December 2012 following a period in the opposition.

Kishida’s stagnant popularity has dragged on for a considerable period now, The Mainichi Shimbun poll has put his support below the 30% mark for 13 months, Jiji Press for 12 months, Asahi Shimbun for 10 months, and Yomiuri Shimbun for 9 months running.

His disapproval ratings, meanwhile, remain high, trending from the high 50% to the low 70% range. Dissatisfaction with the administration’s policy choices ranks high on the list of reasons given by respondents in all the surveys.

Public Support for the Administration (July 2024)

Approval

Disapproval

Notes: Numbers in parentheses indicate point changes from the previous month’s results. Questions asked to respondents and methodologies differ for each organization; Jiji uses individual interviews, Mainichi uses texts sent to mobile phones and automated response queries sent to fixed phones, and the other companies use randomized calls to mobile and fixed phone numbers. NHK and Jiji Press carried out their surveys around July 5–8, Nikkei on July 26–28, and the remaining organizations around July 19–21.

Limited Boost from Help with Utilities Bills?

Prime Minister Kishida recently announced that his government would reintroduce a relief measure to help households pay gas and electricity bills for three months beginning in August. This was received positively by a majority of respondents to surveys, including those from Kyōdō News, NHK, and Yomiuri.

In the negative column for the prime minister, meanwhile, surveys by Nikkei, Jiji, and Asahi saw higher numbers of respondents selecting “a new party in power” rather than “a government built around the LDP” as their preferred outcome of the next general election.

In the July 7 Tokyo gubernatorial election, Koike Yuriko, backed by the LDP and its junior coalition partner Kōmeitō, won her third term as governor. This success was not replicated at the Tokyo metropolitan assembly level, though, as six of the eight candidates fielded by the LDP in by-elections for open seats lost.

The months to come offer events and milestones to keep an eye on when tracking popular support for the administration going forward. In September the LDP will hold its presidential contest, effectively determining who will be prime minister, and the opposition Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan will select its next leader as well. At the end of October, Japan will have just one year left until the end of the terms of the current membership of the House of Representatives, the deadline for the next general election.

(Originally published in Japanese on July 31, 2024. Banner photo: Prime Minister Kishida Fumio answers journalists’ questions after visiting a welfare facility in Machida, Tokyo, on July 26, 2024. © Jiji.)