The findings of the survey come following a tough couple of weeks for the White House as it responds to the controversies surrounding the National Security Agency leaks, the targeting of conservative groups by the IRS and the way the attacks in Benghazi were handled in September of last year.

The approval rating for Obama was at 53% in the mid May poll. Obama’s rating fell the biggest amongst those people under 30 years of age, which was a major blow for him.

For only the first time since he took office, just half of the people in the U.S. consider Obama trustworthy and honest found the survey. About 60% said the U.S. government had grown too much in power in size and it posed a threat to the liberty and rights of Americans.

Over the NSA surveillance, Americans were split. Fifty-five percent said the White House administration was about right or has not done enough in restricting the civil liberties of people in the fight against terrorism, compared to just 43% who said the White House has gone too far.

Fifty-two percent said they do not approve the actions taken by Edward Snowden the whistleblower for the NSA. Fifty-four percent said the government of the U.S. should have him extradited to stand trial.

Just over 50% said the White House was correct to gather telephone records of the majority of the people in the U.S., while 66% said the White House had been correct in gathering data from the Internet in countries to locate suspected terrorists.

The President also chose the former chief of a major U.S. Catholic charity as the nation’s representative at the Vatican.

Officials at the White House said the President had chosen Rufus Gifford to serve as the U.S. ambassador to Denmark. During the President’s re-election campaign of 2012, Gifford was the head of fundraising as well as for the inaugural committee.

Obama nominated two of his top fundraisers for posts in Europe, which kept with a presidential tradition that is longstanding of rewarding donors by giving them good diplomatic positions.

James Costos, an executive at HBO, was named to be the new U.S. ambassador to Spain. Obama named John Emerson, an investment and management firm executive, to be the next U.S. ambassador to Germany.

Both Costos and Gifford are openly gay and their appointments drew high praise from a gay and lesbian support group.

The President’s choice to be envoy to the Vatican, Ken Hackett, retired in 2012 as Catholic Relief Services’ CEO and president.

Two careers state department diplomats were nominated by Obama to serve ambassador posts in Ethiopia and Brazil. Patricia Marie Haslach will be the next U.S. ambassador to Ethiopia and Liliana Ayalde will be the next U.S. ambassador to Brazil.

All the nominees announced on Friday by the White House must first receive Senate confirmation before being officially named to their posts.

The authorization means the involvement by the U.S. in the civil war of two years has deepened. However, U.S. officials have not decided what form of weaponry or how much it will send to the rebel forces.

Another worry is how to make sure the weapons do not get into the hands of the extremists that are also battling to take control of Syria.

On Thursday, officials in the U.S. confirmed the authorization by Obama, after the White House released that is was in possession of conclusive evidence that the current regime of Assad has used chemical weapons during the conflict, against rebel forces.

Obama said previously that using chemical weapons would be crossing the “red line” which suggests more intervention by the U.S.

The U.S. said the number of people killed by chemical weapons is between 100 and 150, which pales in comparison to the total deaths in the conflict of more than 93,000. However, the White House administration views the use of chemical against as going against international norms.

The deputy national security adviser for Obama, Ben Rhodes, said the multiple attacks using chemical weapons gave the situation greater urgency. Rhodes said both the scope and scale of what the U.S. does will be different going forward.

A range of different weapons could be given to the rebels by the White House. Those include but are not limited to assault rifles, small arms, anti-tank missiles and more. Rebel forces without the need for extensive training can operate the majority of that type of weaponry.

The opposition of Obama to send American troops to Syria adds to the unlikeliness that the U.S. would provide more sophisticated arms or any anti-aircraft weapons requiring a larger scale training period.

Officials at the White House also worry that high-powered weaponry could end up in the hands of groups that carry out terrorism.

Amongst the supporters fighting on the ground for Assad are Hezbollah fighters, while the rebels are back by extremist with links to al-Qaeda.

Furman will replace the outgoing Alan Krueger as the chief of the White House Council of Economic Advisers. He has a Harvard University PhD in economics and has been an adviser for Obama since Obama’s election campaign in 2008.

Furman was instrumental in putting together the policies for the administration on taxes, the formulation of the healthcare overhaul, the White House response to the recession and efforts to stave off last year’s fiscal cliff.

The appointment is expected to be announced at 2:10 Monday afternoon.

Krueger was confirmed in November of 2011 as the CEA chair and will be returning to Princeton University to teach, where he had been on leave. In order to maintain tenure, Krueger was required to return to the school this fall.

Furman currently is the assistant to President Obama for economic policy and was a Clinton Administration economist.

The CEA gives advice to the president on all international and domestic economic policy based upon economic research and data. The chairman of the CEA is a member of the cabinet and requires a confirmation by the Senate.

Furman’s former colleagues said he would be effective due to his good relationship with the staff at the White House and especially with the president.

The appointment will likely mean that tax and budgets fights with Washington lawmakers will continue to take on a high-profile role in economic policy in the White House. It might also raise the CEA profile within the White House as well.

Obama said the bill currently before the Senate has its flaws but it is a compromise and no one will get what they want in its entirety. However, he said overall the bill is consistent with what he has laid out for a commonsense reform in immigration.

Harry Reid the Majority Leader in the Senate filed a motion on Thursday to end debate over the bill that was introduced by eight senators know as the bipartisan Gang of Eight. Four are Republicans and four are Democrats.

Obama said the reform bill would give the nearly 11 million undocumented immigrants living in the U.S. a pathway to citizenship provided they can meet criteria outlined in the legislation. The bill also will strengthen the country’s border security and modernize the immigration system.

Obama said there is broad support for the legislation from both Democrats and Republicans, labor leaders, CEOs, clergy and law enforcement. Because of that, Obama believes the bill could be on his desk and ready to be signed into law by the end of this summer.

Republican Senator Mike Lee from Utah said he wanted immigration reform through a series of small bills instead of one large one. He insists the current option is a false one and there were other choices that were better.

Obama urged citizens to call their legislators and tell them to support the new immigration reform. The President said the opposition would only put fear into people and create division, by playing politics.

Rice will be replacing current NSA Tom Donilon. At the same time, Obama is expected to nominate Samantha Power, a former aide at the National Security Council to take the place of Rice as the United Nations ambassador.

Obama considered Rice last year for Secretary of State, before deciding on John Kerry instead. Part of his reason for doing so was due to the controversy that surrounded the Benghazi, Libya attack on September 11.

Rice has been an associate for many years of the President. During his first campaign in 2008, Rice worked as his advisor on foreign policy.

Senate Republicans last year threatened to block the nomination of Rice as the country’s top diplomat, but the President does not need a Senate confirmation for the national security adviser position.

Donilon will not leave his position until July as he is currently working on trips for the President to China, Africa and Europe.

It was expected that Donilon would retire at some point this year and it was considered that Rice would be the top candidate to replace him.

Rice was heavily criticized by Republicans who investigated the Benghazi incident over interviews on television she gave in the days following the attack. She attributed the attacks to people who were protesting over a film that was anti-Islam. However, the White House administration later called it a terrorist attack that had been pre-planned. Members of the GOP accused Rice of covering it up.

In his Saturday weekly address, Obama said there were many reasons the country should feel optimistic about the direction it is headed in. The important thing, said Obama, is to continuing heading in the right direction.

This week the White House administration extended the Home Affordable Modification Program another two years. HAMP is an initiative that helps people that have trouble with their mortgages.

The Department of Housing and Urban Development and the Treasury Department announced on Thursday homeowners now have until December of 2015 to get help from the program.

Under the HAMP program, over 1.1 million owners of homes have been given permanent modification to their mortgages as of April 1. These modifications lowered their mortgage payments by an average of more than $546 per month, about 38% less than what borrowers were previously paying.

On Saturday, Obama praised the new extension saying a housing market once in disarray is now showing signs of strengthening, with construction growing and a drop in prices of homes.

However, Obama said to keep the economy and the housing market growing, Congress had to do its part. Obama said things need to be done and progress made until the families in the middle class start regaining some semblance of security.

He said Congress had to pass the law that would give every homeowner a chance to save nearly $3,000 each year on mortgage payments by refinancing at interest rates that are historically low.

Immigration reform is also staring Congress in the face and those efforts must be worked on so a commonsense reform bill can be passed, said the President.

The president said drones would only be used when an imminent threat was present; when the capture of the terrorist targeted was hopeless; when a near certainty was present that no civilians would be harmed; and there existed no other governments with the capability of effectively addressing the current threat.

Obama said a strike by a drone would never be punitive.

The President said that those who are killed as collateral damage would haunt the U.S., but he insisted that the individuals targeted use indiscriminate violence and the toll from acts of deadly terrorism against Muslims is far higher than any body count of casualties of civilians from the strikes carried out by drones.

Obama added that it is not always possible to send in the military’s Special Forces, such as what was done with Osama bin Laden, to eradicate terrorism, and even if that were true, sending troops could mean additional deaths for both sides.

The end results would mean more U.S. military deaths, more downed Blackhawks, more confrontations with locals and the possibility of mission creep to support the raids escalating into a full blown war.

Americans are split on how and where drones should be able to be used, according to a poll taken in March by Gallup.

Sixty-five percent of respondents agreed that drones should be sent in against suspected terrorists living abroad.

However, only 41% responded that drones should be used to fight against American citizens who the government suspects are terrorists in other countries.

Obama also stated that Guantanamo Bay threatened to create enemies of the U.S. and diminish America’s moral standing in the rest of the world.

On Thursday, the American Action Forum, will release a letter, which is the latest attempt from conservative economists, who have seen a division in their ranks on the overhaul immigration that is currently in the Senate.

The AAF economists wrote in their letter that the positive impact of immigration reform would be seen through labor force growth, population growth, housing growth and in other markets, which would lead to the country’s economic growth picking up. This, wrote the economists, will in turn be positive for the federal budget.

The total signing the letter was 111. The economists mentioned the Congressional Budget Office, which is nonpartisan, in noting that the immigration legislation could increase the economic growth over the next 10 years by 0.1% and lower the government deficit by some $300 billion.

The Senate’s legislation, which would be the biggest change of immigration law in the U.S. in over a generation, has divided the Republican Party.

Some GOP members agree with the proposed pathway to citizenship in the bill for the nearly 11 million people currently living inside the U.S. without proper legal status.

However, others want the focus to be on enforcement. Opponents to the legislation say the reform will just draw additional immigrants into the country illegally.

The Heritage Foundation, which is conservative, released a detailed report earlier this month suggesting that immigrants would cost taxpayers over $6.3 trillion more than what they would pay through taxes during their lifetimes.

The organization the National Citizenship and Immigration Services Council is led by its president Kenneth Palinkas. He said the union never was approached by the bipartisan lawmakers who crafted the sweeping immigration reforms that are now being considered by Congress.

Palinkas claims the lawmakers drafted the legislation with special interests’ in mind and does not address many of the most serious immigration concerns the USCIS Council currently has about the system.

The union members are officers from the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, which is responsible for processing different visas and other paperwork regarding immigration.

The union leader said the legislation does not address pressures he claims are placed upon the adjudication officers to rubber stamp the application rather than conducting case reviews for each. He also said more had to be done to address the overstays on student visas.

Earlier in May, the National ICE Council, a union representing over 7,000 agents sent Congress a letter criticizing the new proposed immigration reform legislation saying they would not support it. Three major unions represent the immigration agents and officers in the country.

President Obama remains optimistic that the strategy in the Senate using the bipartisan approach is the best.