Washington: American voters in 2016 were happy with the President they have, but aren't all that satisfied with the choices to replace him, an early exit poll showed.
Nationwide, 54 per cent of voters going to the polls on Tuesday said they approve of the job Barack Obama is doing as President, but only about four in 10 said they would be excited or optimistic about a Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump presidency, showed the exit poll conducted for CNN and other news networks by Edison Research.
And more -- nearly seven in 10 -- said they were dissatisfied or angry with the way the government was working.
The polls also showed that voters made up their mind whom to vote for a long time ago, CNN reported.
Some 62 per cent of voters decided before September whom their candidate would be. Another 26 per cent decided in either September or October.
But only 12 per cent decided over the past week or in the last few days. This suggests that the recent revelations of the FBI investigation into Hillary Clinton's e-mails and Donald Trump's "locker room" talk and accusations of inappropriate sexual behaviour did not have much impact on Americans as they went to the polls.
About four in 10 voters said their top priority in a candidate was one who could bring needed change, but a similar share said they were voting on experience or judgment. Fewer said they were seeking an empathetic candidate.
Majorities called the economy their most important issue, but impressions of the economy itself have ticked up compared with those found in 2012 exit polls.
Voters were about evenly split between Clinton and Trump on which candidate would better handle the economy.
About eight in 10 said they were at least somewhat confident that the results of the election would be counted accurately.
Results for the national poll are based on interviews with 15,455 voters, and have a margin of sampling error of plus or minus two percentage points.
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