Two GOP governors critical of Trump are the country’s most popular governors

Two Republican governors who have been critical of President Trump are the nation’s most popular governors, according to a new poll.

Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker and Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan are the most and second-most popular U.S. governors, respectively, according to a Morning Consult poll released Thursday.

{mosads}Baker, a blue-state Republican, received a 72 percent approval rating, ranking at the top of the poll for the eighth-straight quarter.

According to the poll, Hogan, who also governs a blue state, received 68 percent of his state’s registered voters’ support.

Both governors were named the two most popular governors according to a similar survey by Morning Consult that was published last July. Baker’s approval rating jumped 3 percentage points since July, while Hogan’s remained unchanged.

The two have a history of breaking with the Trump administration.

Baker captured headlines for his fierce opposition to Trump in a gubernatorial debate in November, during which the blue-state governor was asked to described the president in three words.

“Only three,” he said. “Outrageous. Disgraceful. And a divider.”

Baker has publicly discussed not voting for Trump in the 2016 presidential election and canceled the deployment of Massachusetts’s National Guard troops to the border in June in protest of the Trump administration’s “zero tolerance” policy that led to the separations of hundreds of migrant families.

Hogan similarly distanced himself from Trump in the wake of the zero tolerance policy, pulling out his state’s National Guard helicopter and four crew members from New Mexico.