Trump’s signature tariff plan draws divided reaction at State of the Union

Republicans rejoiced when President Donald Trump spoke during his State of the Union address Tuesday about his plans to continue imposing global tariffs after the Supreme Court dealt him a setback, according to live reactions from a panel of voters.

The panel, assembled by the polling group Maslansky & Partners and made up of 29 Democrats, 30 independents and 41 Republicans, gave their reactions in real time as Trump spoke. Responses were displayed on a line graph, with higher values ​​indicating positive reactions and lower values ​​indicating negative reactions.

Trump called the Supreme Court’s decision overturning the tariffs “unfortunate” as four justices sat poker-faced in the front row of the House chamber.

A panel reacted when President Donald Trump spoke about tariffs during the State of the Union address on February 24, 2026. (Fox News)

It is customary for judges to be invited to the address, although not all usually attend. Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Elena Kagan, Amy Coney Barrett and Brett Kavanaugh were in attendance Tuesday.

Trump has touted the tariffs, which he imposed unilaterally last year under an emergency law, as a key negotiating tool, saying they have helped him broker peace deals between other countries and generated billions of dollars in revenue. The Supreme Court ruled that Trump illegally circumvented Congress by invoking the law, known as the International Emergency Economic Powers Act.

Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts and Associate Justices Elena Kagan, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett during the State of the Union address on the Capitol Hill in Washington, DC, Tuesday, February 24, 2026. (Graeme Sloan/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

But “just four days ago, an unfortunate decision from the Supreme Court of the United States just came down, a very unfortunate decision,” Trump said, as the dials on the line graph showed Republicans reacting with approval and Democrats and independents responding negatively.

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President Donald Trump speaks during a “Make America Wealthy Again” trade announcement event in the Rose Garden of the White House April 2, 2025, in Washington, DC. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

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“The good news is that almost every country and business wants to keep the deal they’ve already made… knowing that the legal power I have as president to make a new deal could be much worse for them. And, therefore, they will continue to work on the same successful path that we negotiated before the Supreme Court’s unfortunate involvement,” Trump said.

Trump said he had “proven” alternatives to IEEPA that he planned to use so he could once again circumvent Congress’s role in authorizing the tariffs, which the Supreme Court ruled functioned as a tax and therefore required congressional approval under the Constitution.

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