Supreme Court Sees Modest Popularity Gain in New Polls, Still Outperforms Other Branches

The U.S. Supreme Court (Photo 81937138 © Steven Frame | Dreamstime.com) A recent YouGov poll, conducted in early May, finds that 38% of Americans approve of the job the Supreme Court is doing, while 45% disapprove. That -7 net disapproval may not seem very impressive. But it's way better than the other two branches of government.

In recent surveys, an average of 58% disapprove of Donald Trump, compared to 38% who disapprove. Congress' approval rating is much lower, still.

The Court's current numbers are also a modest improvement from polls conducted in mid to late 2025. At that time:

• An Economist/YouGov poll found a net -16 disapproval (51-35).
• Gallup found a -10 disapproval (52-42).
• Quinnipiac found a -13 disapproval (53-40).

In fairness, a July 2025 YouGov poll found almost identical results to their most recent one (45% disapprove, 40% approve). But that appears to have been an outlier at the time.

To the extent that the Court has become less unpopular, it may be in part because of the recent decision in the tariff case (which I helped litigate). The May YouGov poll found 58% approving of the result, while only 25% disapprove. An earlier YouGov poll, conducted right after the ruling, found 60% approve and 23% disapprove. Thus, I may have helped make the Supreme Court a little more popular (or, rather, less unpopular).

I'm sure I will get invited to all the cool SCOTUS holiday parties this year (OK, almost certainly not….).

Before going further, I should emphasize that public opinion is a poor barometer of the quality of the Court's decisions. Survey data shows most Americans know very little about the Constitution and the Court's work, and a majority cannot even name one Supreme Court justice.

Similarly, I do not claim that broad public support for the tariff decision proves that the justices got it right (though I do in fact believe they got it right, for other reasons). Ideally, the justices should not be guided by public opinion. Insulating them from it is one of the reasons why they have life tenure.

But, as I have noted in the past, public opinion about the Court does matter in some ways. A highly unpopular Court is more vulnerable to measures to curb or even destroy its authority, such as court-packing. And the Court can more easily strike down major policy initiatives of the president and other political leaders if it knows doing so will enjoy substantial public support. If the Court becomes sufficiently unpopular, politicians could potentially defy its rulings with little fear of political consequences.

Thus, while it is unlikely the Court decided the tariff case as it did merely because the tariffs are unpopular, that unpopularity may have made it easier for the justices to strike down one of Donald Trump's signature policy initiatives. For these and other reasons, the Court's degree of public approval can matter. That's true even though the public's assessment of the Court's work says little about whether the justices are actually doing so.