After President Donald Trump won a sweeping victory in 2024 with the promise to reverse the damage Democrats’ disastrous open borders agenda caused to the United States, Democrats were aghast. But the message was clear — President Trump ran and won on a mandate to secure the border and restore the rule of law.
Once President Trump’s deportations began to take effect, with special emphasis on deporting illegal aliens with a criminal record, he was immediately ridiculed by Democrats as out of touch and creating a political liability for Republicans. Prominent Democrats defended radical protestors rallying against Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers doing their jobs, and Democrat-appointed judges enacted a series of universal injunctions to block Trump’s deportation efforts.
Fifteen months out from the midterm election cycle, left-wing Democrats and the mainstream media are working overtime to portray the actions of President Trump and Congressional Republicans on illegal immigration as rash and out of touch with voters.
The reality is that while a sizable share of the country does take issue with at least a portion of the president’s immigration agenda, it is a smaller group than you might think. Polling shows over half the country is behind President Trump on handling illegal immigration, which is after all the focal point of his administration’s agenda. What is more, handling immigration continues to be one of the GOP’s strongest issues eight months into Trump’s second term. Under Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, immigration was consistently one of the party’s weakest issues, and it still is.
A new Wall Street Journal poll of 1,500 registered voters conducted July 16-20 finds that despite the vocal backlash from Democrats and activists, over half of voters — 51 percent — approve of the job Trump is doing on handling illegal immigration. 41 percent of voters strongly approve of the president’s approach. Still, the survey finds that nearly half of Americans disapprove, with 49 percent of voters saying they disapprove of Trump’s approach and 40 percent saying they strongly disapprove. While a sizeable share of voters do disapprove of various aspects of Trump’s approach, his approach to illegal immigration specifically aligns with the preferences of just over half the country.
What is more, voters have completely lost faith in the Democratic Party’s ability to solve the immigration crisis it engineered. While a portion of voters disagree with President Trump, his approval rating on handling immigration is still higher than his predecessor Joe Biden’s was throughout much of his presidency. And today, immigration is one of Democrats’ weakest issues — and one of the GOP’s strongest.
The Wall Street Journal survey shows voters say by a full twenty-four points Republicans are better able to handle immigration compared to Democrats. Almost half the public — 48 percent — say Republicans are better equipped to handle immigration, while only 24 percent say Democrats are. Eight percent say both are equally equipped and almost one-in-five (19 percent) say neither are. That 24-point margin on immigration is the widest margin Congressional Republicans received over Democrats in the poll. Although the GOP leads on tariffs by seven points, inflation by ten points, and the economy by twelve points, none of those issues deliver as strong of an advantage for Republicans as handling the border crisis does.
The message is clear. President Trump and the GOP’s approach to solving the illegal immigration crisis is working, and voters are aware. Slightly over half the public agrees with the multifaceted approach the president is taking to handle illegal immigration, and Americans agree by double-digits that Congressional Republicans are better able to handle the immigration issue compared to Democrats.
So why the perpetual backlash from the left on solving the immigration crisis, why won’t Democrats cede the point and focus on the environment or some other issue where the party is more popular? Democrats arguably have a stake in facilitating illegal immigration both in an attempt to pad the voter rolls and in an attempt to appease industry’s demand for cheap labor at the expense of Americans.
Democrats are also painfully aware of their party’s failed legacy on immigration. The party is perpetually seen as weak and ineffective in public opinion surveys, and that is a risk to the Democratic brand. By framing President Trump’s approach to illegal immigration as going too far, they are better able to deflect from their own failures on the border. If Democrats had been properly mitigating the border crisis, the need for mass deportations would be substantially reduced. The mass deportations are the fault of Democrats. If conservatives had our way, most illegal individuals would not be in the country to begin with.
Whatever their reasons for remaining perpetually opposed to securing the border and restoring the rule of law, it isn’t working in the court of public opinion. Democrats allying with anti-ICE protests and attempting to block the president on deportation have only deteriorated trust in party leadership. It is likely Democrats will run in the midterms next year on an anti-Trump approach to immigration, but it will be difficult for the party to gain momentum when they are seen as the architect of the current crisis and unwilling to take steps to solve it.
Manzanita Miller is the senior political analyst at Americans for Limited Government Foundation.
