April 21, 2017
Americans disagree with President Trump’s immigration priorities, according to a new CNN/ORC poll, with nearly two-thirds of Americans saying they’d like to see a path to legal status for undocumented immigrants rather than deportations.
This is a complete reversal from polling in previous years, when pollsters found large majorities opposed to mass amnesty and supporting mass expulsion. But now that mass expulsion is not a theory but being advocated by the White House, many Americans are more concerned about families being broken up or being sent back to countries with huge crime rates.
The same has happened with health care, as majorities opposed to Obamacare have dried up when confronted with a Trump plan to kick 24 million off health insurance,
Trump has made tough border security and strict enforcement of US immigration laws a focal point of his campaign and presidency—using some of his first executive orders to pave the way for far more deportations and detentions as well as ordering the construction of a Southern border wall.
But a CNN/ORC poll taken last month finds the public is actually moving in the opposite direction since Trump took office.
Americans are more likely to say that the nation’s top immigration priority should be to allow those in the US illegally to gain legal status—and six in 10 say they are more concerned that deportation efforts will be overzealous than they are that dangerous criminals will be overlooked.
All told, 60 percent say the government’s top priority in dealing with illegal immigration should be developing a plan to allow those in the US illegally who have jobs to become legal residents. In contrast, 26 percent say developing a plan to stop illegal border crossings should be the top priority but only 13 percent say deportation of those in the US illegally should be the first priority.
The number who prioritize legal status for those working in the US illegally is up from 51 percent who said so last fall. That shift comes across party lines, with Democrats and independents each 10 points more likely and Republicans 8 points more likely to choose a plan for legal status now compared with last fall.
Offering citizenship to those immigrants who are living in the US illegally but hold a job, speak English and are willing to pay back taxes is immensely popular, with 90 percent backing such a plan. That’s consistent across party lines, with 96 percent of Democrats, 89 percent of independents and 87 percent of Republicans supporting it.
The President has described his immigration policies as focused on removing criminals, which was actually the Obama policy.
CNN/ORC interviewed 1,025 American adults by phone from March 1 to 4 for the poll, which has a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percentage points.