November 2008 – America’s Voice National Poll (Lake Research Partners and Benenson Strategy Group)
On behalf of America’s Voice, Lake Research Partners and Benenson Strategy Group conducted a survey of 1000 voters between November 5 and 9, 2008. The margin of error was +/- 3.1%.
Seventy-eight percent of voters believe that undocumented immigration is a serious problem. When asked whether they believed undocumented immigration was a problem facing the country, 43% of respondents said it was a very serious problem, 35% said it was a somewhat serious problem, while only 21% said it was somewhat not serious or not at all serious.
Fifty-five percent of all voters believe immigration reform should be a high priority for Congress. The majority of respondents believed that enacting immigration reform should be a high priority for the new Congress. Only 3% of all respondents believed it should be the single highest, while 27% said it should be a very high priority.
Two-thirds of voters agree that undocumented immigrants should be required to “register and become legal.” When asked “Most government officials believe that to deal with the problem of illegal immigration, we need to make our borders secure, crack down on employers who knowingly hire illegal immigrants, and deport illegal immigrants who commit crimes. In addition to these steps, what should be done about the 12 million illegal immigrants here in the United States?”, 67% of all respondents said that undocumented immigrants should be required to register and become legal, 14% said they must leave the country, and 13% said they should be allowed to stay temporarily.
Voters agree that Congress should pass comprehensive immigration reform rather than simply enforcing current law. By a margin of 27%, voters preferred comprehensive immigration reform to enforcement of existing law. Sixty percent of voters believed the new Congress should pass comprehensive legislation to address immigration reform. Thirty-three percent of all respondents supported enforcing current legislation.
Sixty-two percent of voters would rather allow undocumented immigrants to stay in the country and become legal taxpayers than force them to leave on the theory that they are “taking American jobs.” Sixty-two of respondents believed that undocumented immigrants should be allowed to become legal taxpayers rather than forcing them to leave the country because they were taking American jobs, while only 21% said they should leave the country.
