A new poll reveals that about a third of Republicans believe the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) wields too much power—even though it has a strong conservative majority.
The Emerson College Supreme Court Report showed that 33% of Republicans think the nation’s highest court has too much power, although 51% of them also approved of the court. Democrats, on the other hand, approved of the court at a rate of 66%, despite its tendency to lean to the right since the appointment of three conservatives under former president Donald Trump.
Brett Kavanaugh, Neil Gorsuch, and Amy Coney Barrett were all appointed to fill open seats on the Supreme Court.
According to Columbia University political science professor Robert Shapiro, Republicans are more worried about “suspicion of government power” within the “deep state” while Democrats “have the opposite view.” He added that Republicans are concerned about deep-rooted issues but are generally pleased with how SCOTUS has been operating.
Another political science expert from Northeastern, Dan Urman, has said that there is typically a time frame of a few years during which newly appointed justices “get their footing.” He also pointed out that Barrett, though praised as a strong conservative at the time of her appointment, is a “principled conservative” who is also a “potential swing vote.”
Another statistic shown by the poll results indicates that 40% of Republicans believe justices generally vote in line with the presidents who appoint them instead of nonpartisan voting. Roughly 64% of Democrats agree with this statement.
The data follows two surveys from 2022 which indicate similar trends. One from February of that year showed that 58% of American adults believed SCOTUS has the proper amount of power, which fell from 65% in 2020.
The following October, a separate survey revealed that 54% of Americans viewed the government as having too much power and 53% believing it was doing too much in an effort to solve national issues.
