Americans' top priority is job creation, not deficit reduction, by a two-to-one margin, an exclusive Morning Joe/Marist poll found.
Of those polled, 64%-- 76% of Democrats and 46% of Republicans-- said they want the government to create jobs more than they want it to address the mounting deficit.
Deficit reduction should be the priority, said 33%; a slim majority of Republicans, 51%, favor the deficit reduction as the top priority.
The Morning Joe/Marist poll found that more Americans, 44%, favor the president’s plan to address the deficit through a combination of spending cuts and increasing tax revenues, than Republican plans to cut spending exclusively. Forty percent believe Republicans in Congress have a better plan; and 9% say neither have a proper plan to tackle the issue.
"The fact of the matter is, what this poll shows you -- and these are the numbers that the White House is reading. They know that the average American is thinking about the security of a job, wondering about job creation, the president's message makes job creation a larger part of his message," msnbc's Chuck Todd explained. "The Republican message on the debt here in Washington has not done a good job of connecting it to short term job creation and economic anxiety that people feel out there."
The poll was conducted March 25-March 27 of 1,219 national respondents using both landline phone and cell phone. It has a margin of error of plus-minus 3.0 percentage points.
Watch the full Morning Joe/Marist poll discussion and find out more findings from the new national poll.