WASHINGTON – As President Donald Trump faces significant pushback from federal judges, a new poll shows U.S. adults are more likely to believe the president is the one overstepping his power rather than the courts -- although Republicans largely think the opposite.
According to a poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, about half of Americans say the president has “too much" power in the way government operates these days. On the other hand, Americans are more likely to believe the federal courts have an appropriate amount of authority. Only about 3 in 10 U.S. adults say that federal judges have “too much” power.
Recommended Videos
Republicans see it the other way: Roughly half say the federal judiciary has too much power, and only about 2 in 10 say the president does.
The survey comes as Trump has issued a record number of executive orders and pushed the boundaries of presidential power, wresting from Congress its constitutional authority to determine spending levels and defying court orders on immigration. The Republican president has directed the Department of Justice to go after his enemies, pressured law firms he sees as antagonistic and used the threat of federal prosecution to coerce officials and others to support his agenda.
The courts have generally been the only branch of government to push back on Trump's plans, while the GOP-controlled Congress has mostly deferred to him. Only about 3 in 10 Americans say Congress has too much power, and just 17% of Democrats say federal courts have excessive power. On the other hand, the conservative-majority U.S. Supreme Court fares better with Republicans — only about one-quarter think it has too much power, while one-third of Democrats believe that.
About 6 in 10 U.S. adults say Trump has “gone too far” in using presidential power to achieve his goals, the survey found, but concerns over his power are centered among Democrats and independents. Among Republicans, only about one-quarter say Trump has “gone too far,” while about 6 in 10 feel his use of power has been “about right.” About 14% of Republicans feel Trump hasn’t gone far enough.
“He’s been able to do unprecedented things,” said Brie Horshaw, a 35-year-old Los Angeles esthetician and Democrat. “He’s got too much power. It goes beyond what a president would normally do.”
Democrats are largely united in their sense that Trump has “gone too far” in using presidential power, with about 9 in 10 saying this. About 6 in 10 independents feel that way.
The AP-NORC poll is only the latest of several surveys showing that Trump's actions have sparked widespread anxiety.
A Pew Research Center poll found that about half of U.S. adults say Trump is setting too much policy by executive order, while about 3 in 10 say he's doing about the right amount. A CNN-SSRS poll found that 46% of Americans have “a lot” or “some” confidence in Trump's ability to use the power of the presidency responsibly, which is down from 54% in December.
The findings indicate a rising sense of panic among Democrats as Trump takes aggressive actions to implement his agenda. According to the AP-NORC poll, the share of U.S. adults who say the president has too much power in the way the U.S. government operates has jumped significantly since last year, when Democrat Joe Biden was in his final year in office. It has risen from 32% in a March 2024 AP-NORC poll.
Democrats are almost 70 percentage points more likely to say the president has too much power than they were last year, while independents are about 20 percentage points more likely.
Republicans, meanwhile, are less likely to say the president has too much power than they were in March 2024, when 46% believed it, double the 23% who do now. Linda Seck, a retired nurse, said Trump has the same tools Biden had.
“They both had the same power. They might choose to use it differently,” said Seck, 76, a Republican who feels Trump has been using the right amount of power.
The Michigan resident, who once worked for the Department of Veterans Affairs, has cheered Trump and billionaire adviser Elon Musk cutting deeply into the federal workforce without waiting for Congress’ approval. Overall, Seck compared Trump’s behavior to driving on a two-lane road: “I don’t think he’s going over the yellow line, but he’s right there beside it.”
Seck says she’s a believer in the constitutional system of checks and balances and thinks Trump’s power is not unlimited.
“He can’t declare war without consulting Congress. He can’t bully the Federal Reserve,” Seck said.
Seck, however, joins fellow Republicans in fearing individual federal judges have too much power.
"I don’t think a district judge should be able to overrule the federal government,” she said. “That’s the job of the Supreme Court.”
Other polls show that Americans are broadly more concerned about presidential than judicial overreach. A Fox News poll, for example, found that about half of Americans are more concerned about the president ignoring rulings from the judicial branch, while about 3 in 10 say they're more worried about the judicial branch going beyond its authority.
And few think the president has the power to override the courts. The Fox News poll found that about two-thirds of Americans say the president can't ignore the Supreme Court if the president thinks the justices are overstepping their constitutional authority, while about 2 in 10 say the president can and another 16% are uncertain.
The Pew Research Center poll found that most Americans — including two-thirds of Republicans — think if a federal court rules that a Trump administration action is illegal, the Republican administration would need to follow the court's ruling.
Lynn Cohee, a 48-year-old database administrator and Democrat who lives south of Austin, Texas, is distressed in what he sees as the other branches of government not adequately checking Trump’s actions.
“There’s decisions he’s making where other branches should step in and say, ‘Hey, this isn’t the wisest choice,’” Cohee said. "'Let’s get rid of all these people’ — well, lets talk about it first. The mass deportations, the foreign policy, the whole idea we’re going to take over the Gaza Strip.”
Cohee said he doesn’t follow politics closely, but he’s worried that the intense partisanship stops one part of the government from checking the other.
“With our political parties, it doesn’t become what’s best, but it becomes like sports and I want to see my team win,” he said.
___
Riccardi reported from Denver.
___
The AP-NORC poll of 1,260 adults was conducted April 17-21, using a sample drawn from NORC’s probability-based AmeriSpeak Panel, which is designed to be representative of the U.S. population. The margin of sampling error for adults overall is plus or minus 3.9 percentage points.