Six in 10 Americans say federal government has too much power: Gallup poll

Six in 10 Americans say the federal government has too much power, tying the previous high for the question since Gallup started asking in 2002.

In 2012, 51 percent said the federal government had too much power, which was 60 percent in 2013, 59 percent in 2014, and 60 percent now, the Gallup survey said.

The level was also 51 percent in 2009, before increasing to 59 percent in 2010 after the passage of the Affordable Care Act and ticking down slightly to 57 percent in 2011.

The average annual percentage during President Obama’s first term was 54 percent, which has increased to 60 percent this term.

While around eight in 10 Republicans and conservatives said they think the government has too much power during both of the president’s terms, Democrats, moderates and liberals are now increasingly saying it has too much power.

Twenty-four percent of both Democrats and liberals said the federal government has too much power during the 2009-2012 time period, compared to 37 percent from 2013-2015. The percentage of moderates saying so ticked up from 44 percent to 57 percent over that time period.

The largest increase was among blacks; 28 percent said the federal government had too much power during the president’s first term, compared to 48 percent during his second term thus far.

“In the years prior to the election of Obama as the first black president, blacks generally were more concerned than the general public about the federal government having too much power,” Gallup’s Jim Norman wrote. “Obama’s victory in the 2008 election led to a huge drop over the next year in the number of blacks having these concerns. Since Obama’s re-election, polls the past three years have all shown a resurgence in blacks’ concerns about government power.”

The survey, conducted Sept. 9-13, was based on interviews with 1,025 U.S. adults and has a margin of error of plus or minus 4 percentage points.