New polling from Washington Post-ABC News confirms what previous polls by the Kaiser Family Foundation revealed: Americans think the Supreme Court is a partisan, political institution, and will decide on the Affordable Care Act based on political views.
Half of the public expects the justices to rule mainly based on their “partisan political views,” while fewer, 40 percent, expect their decisions to be rooted primarily “on the basis of the law.” The rest say both equally or do not have an opinion.
After the extremely partisan display put on by Justices Kennedy, Scalio, Alito and Roberts during the three days of hearings on the ACA, it's no wonder. But it's also not a recent development, with the
Kaiser Family Foundation finding in January that 59 percent of the population expects a partisan decision on the ACA.
Of course, a poll from
KFF in March found that 40 percent either thought the law had already been overturned (14 percent) or weren't sure (28 percent). At the same time, it found something that is undoubtedly at play in the perception that the SCOTUS will rule on the law politically: Among those who are dissatisfied with the ACA, 38 percent view it as a proxy for everything that is wrong with Washington. This seems to extend to the SCOTUS.
Armando has more discussion in his diary on the partisan side of the polling.