Poll: 1 in 3 say Obama doesn’t love America

More than a third of Americans don’t think President Obama loves America, according to a new survey.

Less than half of adults, 47 percent, said the president loves his country, while 35 percent said he doesn’t and 17 percent weren’t sure, according to a Huffington Post/YouGov poll released this week. 

{mosads}Sharp partisan differences exist on the subject, with 85 percent of Democrats and 11 percent of Republicans not questioning Obama’s patriotism. Twenty percent of Republicans and independents said they were unsure if Obama loves America, compared with 9 percent of Democrats.

The poll was conducted amid furor last week over former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani’s comment during a dinner in Manhattan that “I do not believe, and I know this is a horrible thing to say, but I do not believe that the president loves America.”

Giuliani later clarified in a slew of interviews that he didn’t question Obama’s patriotism but the president’s apparent lack of expression about his love of the U.S. compared to previous presidents. 

Despite his “blunt language,” Giuliani wrote in a Wall Street Journal op-ed earlier this week, “I didn’t intend to question President Obama’s motives or the content of his heart.”

“Irrespective of what a president may think or feel, his inability or disinclination to emphasize what is right with America can hamstring our success as a nation,” Giuliani added. 

Many Americans in the poll, 45 percent, say Obama is just as patriotic, if not more, than most people publicly. The same poll found that 42 percent have a favorable opinion of Obama, compared with 52 percent who have an unfavorable one.

The survey of 1,000 Americans was conducted Feb. 20-23 via with a margin of error of 4.1 points.