As Trump fights with judges, poll shows voters split on who has too much power

Matthew Medsger, Boston Herald on Mar 19, 2025

By clicking submit, I authorize Arcamax and its affiliates to: (1) use, sell, and share my information for marketing purposes, including cross-context behavioral advertising, as described in our Privacy Policy , (2) add to information that I provide with other information like interests inferred from web page views, or data lawfully obtained from data brokers, such as past purchase or location data, or publicly available data, (3) contact me or enable others to contact me by email or other means with offers for different types of goods and services, and (4) retain my information while I am engaging with marketing messages that I receive and for a reasonable amount of time thereafter. I understand I can opt out at any time through an email that I receive, or by clicking here

Voters are somewhat split on whether the president wields too much authority or if it’s the courts who are acting out of bounds, new polling shows.

According to a national poll of 1,000 registered voters conducted by Hart Research Associates/Public Opinion Strategies on behalf of NBC News, 43% of those polled think the framers of the U.S. Constitution vested too much power in the executive branch when they were constructing the co-equal branches of government, while 39% said the president has the right amount of power and 6% felt the executive is too weak. About 11% reported they did not know or weren’t sure.

Meanwhile, according 28% of those polled, it’s the judiciary — including the U.S. Supreme Court — that has too much authority over the other branches. About half of polled voters thought the courts hold the right amount of power, 8% said it holds too little, and 15%, were unsure or didn’t know.

The question comes as numerous policy initiatives launched by President Donald Trump head toward the Supreme Court by way of the lower district and appellate court structure.

While Trump has frequently taken aim at judges who have attempted to stand in the way of his plans or hold him to account for alleged wrongdoing, he’s most recently been calling for the impeachment of U.S. District Judge James E. Boasberg over the judge’s attempts to prevent the extrajudicial deportation of hundreds of alleged Venezuelan gang members.

After noting that it was he who won November’s presidential election and not the judge, the commander-in-chief said that fighting illegal immigration was part of a mandate given to him by the voters.

“I’m just doing what the VOTERS wanted me to do. This judge, like many of the Crooked Judges’ I am forced to appear before, should be IMPEACHED,” he wrote in a Truth Social post, capitalization his.

Trump’s call for impeachment drew a response from Chief Justice John Roberts, who in a rare public rebuke said that the call to remove a judge over an unsatisfying ruling flies in the face of the whole history of U.S. jurisprudence.

“For more than two centuries, it has been established that impeachment is not an appropriate response to disagreement concerning a judicial decision,” Roberts said. “The normal appellate review process exists for that purpose.”

Trump doubled down in a midnight Truth Social post made early Wednesday, saying that attempts to prevent him from deporting allegedly violent foreign nationals imperil the nation.

“If a President doesn’t have the right to throw murderers, and other criminals, out of our Country because a Radical Left Lunatic Judge wants to assume the role of President, then our Country is in very big trouble, and destined to fail!” he wrote.

_____