Trump turns every day more into a one-note president obsessed with building a wall at our southern border, several recent polls demonstrate that voters now trust Democrats more than Trump and Republicans on border security issues. In fact, under Trump, the country as a whole has become more pro-immigrant by a number of measures.
According to Pili Tobar, Managing Director of America’s Voice, “It seems the more President Trump talks about immigration and the border, the less Americans trust or support his border-related lies and fear-mongering and the larger anti-immigrant worldview it represents.”
See below for more details that underscore why the border wall obsession remains a losing issue for Republicans:
The Washington Post/ABC poll has seen a 12-percentage point swing towards Democrats and away from Republicans on the “who do you trust to handle border security” question just since November 2018.
- The late-January 2019 Post/ABC poll found that Americans trust “Nancy Pelosi and congressional Democrats” over “President Trump and congressional Republicans” to handle border security issues by a 42-40 percent margin.
- The early November pre-election Post/ABC poll found that congressional Republicans were trusted more than congressional Democrats on “handling border security” by a 10-point margin, 49-39 percent. (Of note, the November poll did not include wording with Trump or Pelosi).
The Quinnipiac poll similarly shows voters trust congressional Democrats more than President Trump on border security issues and are tuning out or rejecting Trump’s attempted “drugs” and “crime” justifications for the wall.
- By a margin of 50-41 percent, voters in the late-January Quinnipiac poll trust congressional Democrats more than Trump on border security (Independents trust Democrats by a 50-37 breakdown). In a mid-January Quinnipiac poll, the overall margin on this question was a more narrow 49-44 percent.
- The border wall also remains unpopular, with voters in the Quinnipiac poll opposing building a wall by a 55-41 margin and strongly rejecting the idea that a wall would significantly decrease violent crime (64-33 percent say it would not) or the amount of illegal drugs in the U.S. (60-37 percent say it would not) – two staples of Trump and GOP messaging justifications for the wall.
Americans are growing more pro-immigrant – at the same time Trump peddles falsehoods and fear-mongers on immigrants. Trump and hardline allies such as Stephen Miller have successfully put immigration and immigrants at the forefront of the national consciousness. But the public has grown more, not less, in favor of immigrants in recent years. For example:
- In the newest Quinnipiac poll, by a 75-14 percent, voters think immigration is good for America. Even Republicans think immigration is good for America, by a 60-25 percent margin.
- In a December column titled, “Trump is Making Americans More Immigrant-Friendly,” Frank Wilkinson of Bloomberg explored this dynamic, highlighting a collection of recent polling that shows how, under Trump, the American public is actually growing more pro-immigrant.
- The most recent time the NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll (Sept. 2018) asked whether immigration helps the U.S. more than it hurts it, by a 61-28 percent margin, voters overwhelmingly said immigration helps America. Asked 19 times since 2005, this is the most positive response in the poll’s history – since 2005, voters have swung 49 percentage points in a pro-immigration direction.
