Since the current administration took office, Americans have cooled on its policies and warmed to immigration.
Donald Trump won the U.S. presidency in no small part thanks to his promise to enforce immigration restrictions that the Biden administration largely ignored. Election year polls found more voters preferred Trump over then-president Joe Biden on the issue and even favored his proposals for mass deportations. But the reality of tough border policies is a harsh reality check; since the current administration took office, Americans have cooled on its policies and warmed to immigration.
That’s not to say the country is embracing Biden’s nudge-and-wink approach to border crossings. Instead, people seem to want a middle ground combining enforcement with a touch of humanity.Immigration Helped Win the White House for Trump
The former president took office with big plans to roll back Trump’s tough first-term immigration policies. That didn’t go well for him as border crossings skyrocketed, alarming the public. In February 2024, Bloomberg polling found a rising percentage of voters calling immigration the « single most important issue' » contributing to lagging numbers for Biden across the swing states he eventually lost.
By April, Harris polling recorded majority (51 percent) support for mass deportations. Thirty percent of Democrats and 46 percent of Republicans wanted to end constitutionally protected birthright citizenship.
Two weeks ago, in a very belated election post-mortem, The New York Times conceded that « as public concern over border security grew, partly in response to Mr. Biden’s own actions, his administration proved catastrophically slow to change course » and ultimately lost voters to his rival.
But that was then. Public attention is now occupied not by images of crowds surging across the border and crimes committed by undocumented immigrants, but by stories of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raids and often rough tactics. While federal officials have arrested some serious criminals—though the vast majority of those taken into custody have no criminal convictions and only about 5 percent have violent convictions—Americans hear far more stories about worksite raids that scoop up peaceful, hard-working laborers.
