President at 42% on Presidents Day

 As President Barack Obama marks his sixth Presidents Day in office, his approval ratings remain near the lowest of his presidency.

According to a CNN Poll of Polls compiled Monday, which averages the most recent non-partisan, live operator national surveys, the President's approval rating stands at 42%, with 53% of Americans giving a thumbs down to Obama's performance in the White House.

While the President's approval rating has slightly edged up since November and early December when it was at or near all time lows in many national surveys, it's still far below where it stood a year ago. In February 2013, soon after his second inaugural and just two months removed from his 2012 re-election victory, Obama's approval rating stood at 52% in a CNN Poll of Polls.

The President's numbers tumbled after late spring and summer following controversies over the Edward Snowden intelligence leaks and congressional investigations into IRS targeting of conservative political groups. Then came October and the politically charged botched rollout of Obamacare, his signature domestic policy achievement.

Coupled with legislative setbacks, many pundits labeled 2013 the worst year of Obama's presidency. And for the first time since taking over at the White House in 2009, a majority of the public surveyed disapproved of his job performance.

The silver lining for the President in all these polls: While his numbers are anything but impressive, the approval ratings for Congress overall, and specifically for congressional Republicans and Democrats, are much lower.

The approval rating is considered one of the best gauges of a president's standing with Americans and of his clout with lawmakers here in Washington.

The CNN Poll of Polls is an average of the three non-partisan, live operator, national surveys of the president's approval rating conducted over the past two weeks: Gallup daily tracking poll (Feb. 13-15); Fox News (Feb. 9-11); and Marist-McClatchy (Feb. 4-9). Since it is an average of multiple surveys, the Poll of Polls does not have a sampling error.