New Marquette Law School Poll national survey finds approval of U.S. Supreme Court above 50% for first time since March 2022

This sounds like people now want to be nice to the SC because what’s just turned up in the White House is way too scary!

Large majorities say president must follow Supreme Court decisions, Court can rule laws unconstitutional

Feb. 13, 2025

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Also:

• Majority supports decision upholding law that could ban TikTok
• With sharp partisan differences, majority say Trump should have received more of a penalty for felony conviction
• Also with sharp partisan differences, majority oppose Court decision on immunity for some presidential acts
• Majority support Texas law that would require use of IDs to access internet sex sites

Please note: Complete Poll results and methodology information can be found online at law.marquette.edu/poll

MILWAUKEE – A new Marquette Law School Poll national survey finds that 51% of adults approve of the job the U.S. Supreme Court is doing, while 49% disapprove. In December, approval was 48% and disapproval was 52%. This is the highest that Court approval has been since March 2022, when 54% approved, and follows an upward trend since May 2024.

The trend in approval since 2020 is shown in Figure 1 and Table 1. (All results in the tables are stated as percentages.)

Table 1: U.S. Supreme Court approval

Among adults

 

The latest Marquette Law School Poll’s national Supreme Court survey was conducted Jan. 27-Feb. 5, 2025. The survey interviewed 1,018 adults nationwide and has a margin of error of +/-3.5 percentage points.

Conflict between Supreme Court, President, and Congress

The public believes that the Supreme Court has substantial power in relation to the president and Congress. In a case of the Court ruling against the president, 83% say a president is required to follow the Court’s ruling, while 17% say the president has the power to ignore the Court’s ruling. This opinion has been relatively stable since 2019, as shown in Table 2.

Table 2: Can a president ignore Supreme Court ruling

Among adults

 

While large majorities of all partisan groups think the president must obey Supreme Court rulings, 23% of Republicans say the president can ignore a Court ruling, as compared to 18% of independents and 11% of Democrats, as shown in Table 3.

Table 3: Can a president ignore Supreme Court ruling, by party identification

Among adults

 

An even larger majority, 87%, say the Supreme Court has the power to review laws passed by Congress and to declare them invalid if they conflict with the Constitution, while 13% say the Court lacks this power. This has also been quite stable since 2019, as shown in Table 4.

Table 4: Can Court review laws

Among adults

 

All partisan groups are in close agreement on this power of judicial review of laws passed by Congress, as shown in Table 5.

Table 5: Can Court review laws by party identification

Among adults

 

Recent Supreme Court cases

Last month, in January, the Supreme Court upheld the 2024 federal law requiring that the Chinese-owned social media app TikTok be sold or banned in the United States. A substantial majority of adults, 62%, favor this decision, while 38% are opposed. President Donald Trump has delayed enforcement of the law, which was to take effect Jan. 19, the day before his inauguration.

Republicans are much more supportive of the Court’s decision upholding the law requiring the sale or banning of TikTok than are independents or Democrats. This is despite bipartisan support of the bill in Congress and the fact that former President Joe Biden signed the bill into law. Almost three-quarters of Republicans, 73%, favor the Court’s decision, compared to 53% of independents and 54% of Democrats. These results are shown in Table 6.

Table 6: Favor or oppose Court decision upholding TikTok law

Among adults

 

In this survey, 14% of adults say they use TikTok several times a day, 8% use it several times a week, and 10% use it a few times a month. Some 15% say they used TikTok in the past but have stopped, and 53% have never used it.

Those who make the most use of TikTok are most opposed to the Court’s ruling, while those who have never used the app are most in favor of the Court’s decision. Support for the ruling rises as frequency of use declines, as shown in Table 7.

Table 7: Favor or oppose Court upholding TikTok law, by use of TikTok

Among adults

 

A majority, 65%, favor the Supreme Court’s January decision to allow Trump’s sentencing in his felony conviction in a New York court, which had denied his bid to delay sentencing.

A majority of Republicans, 57%, oppose the Court’s allowing sentencing to proceed, and 43% were in favor of the decision. A large majority, 70%, of independents favored the Court’s allowing sentencing, as did an even larger majority of Democrats, 87%. These results are shown in Table 8.

Table 8: Favor or oppose Court’s allowing Trump sentencing

Among adults

 

Following the Court’s ruling, on Jan. 10, a New York judge gave Trump a sentence of “unconditional discharge,” which included neither jail time nor any other penalties. A minority of adults, 44%, say this was an appropriate sentence, while 55% say Trump should have been given a greater penalty. A large majority of Republicans, 83%, say this was an appropriate sentence, while 69% of independents and 90% of Democrats say there should have been a greater penalty, as shown in Table 9.

Table 9: Was Trump’s sentence appropriate or should there have been a greater penalty

Among adults

 

In January the Supreme Court heard arguments concerning a Texas law requiring adults to prove they are over 18 in order to access sexually oriented internet sites. The law aims to limit access to minors by requiring that a user provide a government-issued ID to prove age. Arguments against the law claimed that it impinges on the rights of adults. The case is expected to be decided by the end of June.

Among adults, 69% say the Court should uphold the law, while 31% say the law should be struck down. Republicans are most in favor of upholding the law, 78%, with independents nearly as supportive at 74%, while Democrats support the law the least at 57%, as shown in Table 10.

Table 10: Should Court uphold law requiring ID to access sexually-oriented internet sites

Among adults

 

A majority, 61%, of the public oppose the 2024 Court decision that found presidents have broad immunity from prosecution for official acts as president, while 39% favor that decision. Opinion on this has changed little since July 2024, immediately after the ruling, as shown in Table 11.

Table 11: Favor or oppose ruling on presidential immunity

Among adults

 

More than two-thirds of Republicans, 68%, favor the holding that presidents are immune for official acts, but 69% of independents and 87% of Democrats are opposed to the decision, as shown in Table 12.

Table 12: Favor or oppose ruling on presidential immunity, by party identification

Among adults

 

Opinion of the Court’s decision in 2022 to overturn Roe v. Wade, the 1973 decision that made abortion legal nationwide, has varied only slightly since the decision. In February, 38% favor the decision and 62% oppose it. In November 2022, 33% favored and 66% opposed overturning Roe v. Wade. The full trend is shown in Table 13.

Table 13: Favor or oppose ruling overturning Roe v. Wade

Among adults

 

Partisan divisions remain strong on the abortion ruling, with 65% of Republicans in favor of overturning Roe v. Wade, while only 36% of independents and 9% of Democrats hold this opinion, as shown in Table 14. These partisan divisions have changed little since 2022.

Table 14: Favor or oppose ruling overturning Roe v. Wade, by party identification

Among adults

 

Views of the Court

In Marquette Law School polling in 2019-2021, more than 60% of adults said the Supreme Court justices’ decisions were motivated mainly by the law, and fewer than 40% said the motivation was mainly politics. In early 2022, this began to shift, and since July 2023 slightly more than half have said the motivation is mainly politics. In this newest (February) survey, 54% say politics is the main motivation for justices and 46% say it is mainly the law. The full trend is shown in Table 15.

Table 15: Decisions motivated by law or by politics

Among adults

 

In 2019, both Republicans and Democrats agreed that decisions were based mainly on the law, with 66% of Republicans and 65% of Democrats saying mainly the law, as did 55% of independents. In the current poll, 63% of Republicans say mainly the law, while only 32% of Democrats and 39% of independents say mainly the law.

The Court has had a majority of justices appointed by Republican presidents for 54 years, since 1970 (with the exception of a 14-month vacancy in 2016-17 which created a 4-4 tie), and the current Court has six justices appointed by Republicans and three appointed by Democrats. A persistent minority of the public has continued to say a majority of justices were definitely or probably appointed by Democratic presidents, but that percentage has declined from the mid-to-upper 20% range to the upper teens now. Likewise, the percentage saying the Court definitely has a majority appointed by Republican presidents has doubled from 19% in September 2019 to 40% in February 2025. This trend is shown in Table 16.

Table 16: Majority of Court appointed by which party’s presidents

Among adults

 

Confidence in institutions

Confidence in several institutions is summarized in Table 17.

Confidence in the presidency increased from 25% with a great deal or a lot of confidence in December to 34% with that much confidence in February. However, those with little or no confidence also increased, from 41% in December to 46% in February.

Not surprisingly this shift was strongly related to partisan feelings about the presidency and the change in administration. In December, 27% of Republicans had a great deal or a lot of confidence in the presidency, while 68% did in February. Democratic confidence moved in the opposite direction, from 25% with high confidence in December to 6% in February. In contrast, high confidence among independents barely moved, from 17% in December to 16% in February.

The Supreme Court has the second highest “great deal/a lot of” confidence rating, after the presidency, with the FBI just 1 percentage point behind. The Department of Justice trails these by 7 percentage points, and also has a higher percentage saying they have little or no confidence.

Congress and the national news media are well below the other institutions in public confidence, with fewer than 15% expressing high confidence for either.

Table 17: Confidence in institutions

Among adults

 

About the Marquette Law School Poll

The survey was conducted Jan. 27-Feb. 5, 2025, interviewing 1,018 adults nationwide, with a margin of error of +/-3.5 percentage points. Interviews were conducted using the SSRS Opinion Panel, a national probability sample with interviews conducted online. The detailed methodology statement, survey instrument, topline results, and crosstabs for this release are available on the Marquette Law Poll website. Some items from this survey, concerning political topics, were released on Feb. 12.

Wording of questions about recent and past Supreme Court decisions: These items do not attempt to exactly frame the particular issues in specific cases but rather address the topic in more general terms.

The wording of questions about recent decisions includes:

TikTok v. Garland

• In January, the Supreme Court upheld a law requiring the social media app TikTok, which is owned by a Chinese company, to be sold or banned in the U.S. How much do you favor or oppose this decision?

Trump v. New York

• In January, the Supreme Court rejected Donald Trump’s request to halt his criminal sentencing in New York where he was convicted in May on 34 felony counts, allowing sentencing to proceed. How much do you favor or oppose this decision?

Free Speech Coalition v. Paxton

• In January the Supreme Court heard arguments concerning a Texas law meant to prevent minors from accessing sexual materials on the internet, through a requirement that adults prove they are 18 or over by submitting government-issued IDs in order to access sexually oriented websites. Do you think the court should uphold this law or strike it down for infringing on the rights of adults?

Trump v. United States

• In July, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that, while there is no immunity for unofficial acts, former presidents have broad immunity from criminal prosecution for official acts as president. How much do you favor or oppose this decision?

Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization

• In 2022, the Supreme Court overturned Roe versus Wade, thus striking down the 1973 decision that made abortion legal in all 50 states. How much do you favor or oppose this decision?