Washington, DC —An updated America’s Voice public opinion memo, available in full online here with toplines below, examines a broad array of recent polling on immigration and highlights key takeaways and larger implications.
According to Vanessa Cárdenas, Executive Director of America’s Voice,
“The more Americans witness the Trump/Miller mass deportation agenda to purge America of immigrants, the more they reject it. A strong majority of the public, including Latino voters, are consistent in what they want: order at the border, enforcement targeted at actual public safety threats, legal channels for hardworking individuals and a process for Dreamers and long-settled immigrants to become U.S. citizens – not targets for detention or deportation. Yet despite the growing opposition to the harms and cruelties of the Trump administration’s vision, pro-immigrant policymakers and allies still have work to do to earn Americans’ trust and deliver on the types of balanced solutions that resonate with the public.”
As detailed in the new America’s Voice memo, available in full online here, recent immigration polling reveals five key lessons on immigration (each explored in detail and with numerous public polls and analysis to substantiate in full memo):
- Trump’s immigration approval is underwater, mass deportation is unpopular and Americans are recoiling from witnessing it in action. While Trump’s overall immigration approval is now underwater by double-digits in recent polling, his deportation agenda is even more unpopular – especially when details about the scope of who’s being targeted are included in polling. For example CNN’s July 2025 polling finds: 59% oppose and 23% support “Arresting and detaining undocumented immigrants who have resided in the United States for years with no criminal record.” As CNN polling editor Ariel Edwards-Levy wrote, “That echoes a theme seen in much immigration polling this year — support for immigration enforcement tends to erode when pollsters specify that people without criminal records or longtime residents will be among those affected.”
- When gauged head-to-head, legal status for undocumented immigrants is decidedly more popular than mass deportation. For example, Quinnipiac University found that by a 64-31% margin, Americans prefer giving most undocumented immigrants in the United States a pathway to legal status vs. “deporting most undocumented immigrants in the United States.” In a December 2024 Quinnipiac poll, the margin was 55-36% – a 14-percentage point change in favor of legalization in recent months.
- Latino voters in particular are hostile to mass deportations and support a path to citizenship. For example, Gallup’s annual deep-dive immigration poll, released earlier in July, found that 91% of Hispanic voters support a path to citizenship, while only 21% approve of “Trump’s handling of immigration.” And an Equis/Data for Progress poll of more than 2,500 registered Hispanic voters found that by “a wide 66-29 margin they believe Trump’s ‘actions are going too far and targeting the types of immigrants who strengthen our nation.’”
- Trump’s growing unpopularity on immigration doesn’t mean Democrats are trusted on immigration. Those opposed to the Trump and Miller immigration vision must re-establish credibility on the issue by defining real solutions and connecting with Americans’ broader immigration sentiments. For example, Third Way national/battleground district polling found, “Democrats started with a 30-point deficit when voters were asked which party they trusted to handle immigration, which grew to a whopping 41 points when it came to border security specifically.”
- The American public – including Latino voters – prefer a balanced immigration approach, pairing border security and a path to legal status, rather than Trump/Miller’s enforcement-only and mass deportation vision. For example, Navigator national polling (conducted by GSG/GBAO) found that in a split-sample question testing descriptions of a balanced approach to immigration against a description of the enforcement-only and mass deportation option, Americans preferred the balanced approach by a 66-25% margin (including 44-14% among those who feel “strongly”) and a 59-33% margin (including 39-22% among those who feel “strongly”) respectively.
Read the full America’s Voice updated polling memo, “Americans Increasingly Reject Mass Deportation, Support Legal Status and Balanced Solutions”
