Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images(WASHINGTON) -- Locked in a tight race for the presidency, Donald Trump prevails in trust to handle most issues in a new ABC News/Ipsos poll, yet President Joe Biden scores competitively on key personal attributes -- leaving wide open the question of who'll prevail come Election Day, now six months away.Excluding people who say they wouldn't vote, Trump has 46% support, Biden 44%, in this national survey of more than 2,200 adults. (Nearly all the rest say they'd pick someone else.) Among registered voters, it's Biden 46%, Trump 45%. Among likely voters, it's Biden 49%, Trump 45%, again not a significant difference.A five-way contest doesn't change the picture in this poll, produced for ABC by Langer Research Associates with fieldwork by Ipsos. This finds the race at 42% for Trump and 40% for Biden, with 12% for Robert F. Kennedy Jr., 2% for Cornel West and 1% for Jill Stein. (That, of course, assumes Kennedy, West and Stein are on the ballot in all states, an open question.) Among registered voters in the five-way race, it's 42-42%, Biden-Trump, and Biden is a non-significant +3 or +4 points in likely voter models.Kennedy gets 12% even though 77% of his supporters say they know "just some" or "hardly anything" about his positions on the issues. Notably, his supporters are more apt to be Republicans or GOP-leaning independents (54%) than Democrats and Democratic leaners (42%, a slight difference given sample sizes), and in a two-way race, they favor Trump over Biden by 13 points. That may explain why Trump attacked Kennedy as a stalking horse in social media posts last week.Another result finds a potential risk for Trump in his current trial in New York on charges of falsifying business records to hide a payoff to a pornographic actress who says they had sex, which he denies. Eighty percent of Trump's supporters say they'd stick with him even if he's convicted of a felony in this case. But that leaves 20% who say they'd either reconsider their support (16%) or withdraw it (4%) -- easily enough to matter in a close race.That said, a chief question raised by the survey is why Biden is competitive at all, given his substantial disadvantages. Just 35% of Americans approve of his job performance, with 57% disapproving; that's 2 points from his career low in approval in January and well below the level historically associated with reelection. Forty-three percent say they've gotten worse off financially under his presidency. An overwhelming 81% say he's too old for another term. Trump easily outpoints him in perceived mental sharpness and physical health.Trump, moreover, leads in trust to handle six of 10 issues tested in the survey, with Biden ahead in just two. That includes, for Trump, the three most-cited issues in importance -- the economy, on which he has a 14-point advantage; inflation, again 14 points; and crime and safety, 8 points. He tops out with a 17-point lead in trust to handle immigration at the U.S.-Mexico border and leads by 8 points in trust to handle the war between Israel and Hamas and 7 points on "America's standing in the world." Biden's leads are on abortion access (+12, but comparatively low-rated as an issue) and health care, +5.It's also the case that Biden lacks traditional Democratic advantages among young adults and Hispanic people, and he's about 20 points weaker among Black people under age 50 than among those 50 and older. But he and Trump run essentially evenly, 42-40%, among independents, who are swing voters in most presidential elections; Biden leads by 11 points among moderates; and among those who have held steady financially -- not gaining ground but at least not losing it -- he's up by a broad 66-21%.FactorsOther factors help explain why, despite his weaknesses, Biden is in the game. He leads by 16 points on one important personal attribute, being seen as honest and trustworthy, and is about tied with Trump on two others -- representing your personal values (Biden +3) and understanding the problems of people like you (Biden +1). And while neither is popular, more people see Biden favorably as a person, 40%, than see Trump favorably, 33%.Further, substantial numbers of Americans don't trust either candidate to handle the issues tested in the survey -- and among them, in most albeit not all cases, Biden leads. For instance, among the 14% who don't trust either to handle the economy (excluding nonvoters), Biden has 49% support, Trump 13%. (The rest mainly pick someone else.) In other examples, Biden leads by 45 points among those who don't trust either candidate on immigration and by 35 points among those who don't trust either on inflation.On personal attributes, among those who don't think either candidate has the mental sharpness it takes to serve effectively -- about three in 10 adults -- Biden leads Trump by 63-15%. It's a similar result among those who don't think either has the physical health to serve. On the other hand, Trump leads by about as wide a margin among those who don't think either is honest and trustworthy.Additionally, while eight in 10 see Biden as too old to serve another term, a smaller majority, 55%, says the same about Trump. And Biden wins 39% support even from those who say he's too old; Trump gets less support, 25%, among those who say this about him.Nonetheless, results on "double-haters" are mixed. Among people who have unfavorable views of both candidates -- a more Republican group -- Trump leads Biden, 48 to 26%. But among those who disapprove of the work both have done during their presidencies -- a more Democratic group -- Biden leads with a similar margin, 48-21%.In any case, it's certainly a match between unpopular figures. More people see Biden as a person unfavorably than favorably, 40-51%, favorable-unfavorable. But Trump's score, as noted, is worse, 33-58%. And 44% see Trump strongly unfavorably, 10 points more than say the same for Biden.Trump pushes back with a better retrospective job approval rating, 44-50%, approve-disapprove, than Biden has today. And among Trump's supporters, 55% back him strongly, vs. 44% strong support for Biden among his supporters.HistoryFrom a historical perspective, Biden has a hill to climb, but not an impossible one. In data since the Truman administration, three presidents with underwater approval ratings in the spring before Election Day won a second term -- Barack Obama in 2012, George W. Bush in 2004 and Harry S. Truman in 1948. Obama and Bush both bottomed out in this period at 47%, Truman at 36%, compared with Biden's 35% today.Of course, historical precedents go only so far, as demonstrated by the 2022 midterms, when the Democrats fared much better than Biden's weak approval rating would have suggested.GroupsFocusing on the two-way Biden-Trump race, results show the pull of partisanship and ideology. Eighty-eight percent of Democrats support Biden; 90% of Republicans are for Trump. (Nine percent of Democrats defect to Trump, while fewer Republicans, 5%, jump to Biden.) Independents, as mentioned, divide essentially evenly. In exit polls, the candidate who won independents has won the election in nine out of the last 12 presidential contests (all but in 2012, 2004 and 1976).As reported Friday, liberals are more apt than others to say the United States is doing too much to support Israel and too little to help protect Palestinian civilians. Yet that doesn't appear to move many votes: 84% of liberals support Biden (vs. 8% for Trump). Across the spectrum, 82% of conservatives prefer Trump (vs. 10% for Biden). Biden leads among moderates, 50-39%, though that's weaker for him than in 2020.Voters age 18-29 divide 43-48%, Biden-Trump; the difference is not statistically significant given the sample size, and it's a far worse result for Biden than the typical Democratic advantage in this group. The same is true for Hispanic people, dividing 46-42%. And while Biden has 74% support from Black people, this, too, is off the usual Democratic lead in this group.Few Black people, 13%, back Trump; as many pick someone else. But there's a notable age gap: Black people age 50 and