Gallup Poll: Voters’ Demand for Less Migration Doubles

Asylum-seekers board a bus after being processed by US Customs and Border Patrol agents at
REBECCA NOBLE/AFP via Getty Images
Neil Munro

Public demand for less immigration has doubled under President Joe Biden’s welcome for roughly 6 million economic migrants, according to a Gallup survey.

Forty percent of Americans want less migration, up from 19 percent in January 2021, said the poll, released February 13. The 40 percent includes 71 percent of Republicans, 36 percent of independents, and 19 percent of Democrats, according to the poll, which did not describe the scale of Biden’s migration.

“Republicans’ displeasure with immigration for being too high is now the highest Gallup has recorded for that party,” said a Gallup statement.

The Republican consensus for lower migration likely will block efforts by establishment-backed GOP legislators to further expand labor migration, despite much media and Democratic celebration for migration.

Biden’s policy of raising migration levels is backed by just 4 percent of Republicans, 7 percent of independents, and 12 percent of Democrats, according to the poll.

The poll also shows pick-up opportunities for the GOP: Fourteen percent of independents and 19 percent of Democrats said they are “dissatisfied” with Biden’s policies without saying if they wanted migration levels to be raised or lowered.

But few Republican politicians are offering a reform agenda that would help Americans raise wages and get better housing. Instead, GOP donors pressure GOP politicians to ignore pocketbook issues and to focus on border chaos, crime, and drugs.

“We talk about [immigration] as a law and order problem but I want to plant the seed both for our colleagues on my side of the aisle and colleagues elsewhere and also for those of you who are interested in this issue,” Vance said, adding:

I’m a very strong believer that we should think about our immigration problem and our immigration crisis as an economic problem as much as a cultural or law and order problem.  Immigration in this country right now, illegal immigration … means wage theft in the form of competition for jobs for lower-wage migrants and in this instance, in the context of housing, illegal immigration means theft of the American dream of housing when you have 25 million people who shouldn’t be here by law competing with American citizens to buy their first home, to rent a home. That is a major problem that we should be talking more about in the context of the immigration crisis.

The Gallup poll echoes prior surveys of growing public opposition — and the increasing rejection of the 1950s “Nation of Immigrants” narrative.

Forty-one percent of Americans want migration reduced, said a May 6-9 poll of 1,,025 adults by Politico and Harvard University’s medical school.

But those numbers likely understate potential opposition to labor migration amid the establishment-wide media cheerleading for the importation of more workers, renters, and consumers. Since January 2021, Biden and his deputies have quietly accepted roughly 6 million economic migrants.

For example, a December 2022 survey by Harvard CAPS/Harris Poll showed that the public grossly underestimated Biden’s migration inflow. The survey also asked:

Over 2.75 million came into the United States illegally over a twelve-month period ending September 2022, more than 1 million more immigrants the previous 12 month period. Given these numbers, should the administration continue its current policies or issue new, stricter policies to reduce the flow of people coming across the border?

In response, 81 percent of Republicans and 68 percent of swing-voting independents called for stricter policies. Just one-third of all voters were content with current lax border policies once they learned the real numbers, according to the poll.

When pollsters provide some justifications, Americans also are more willing to declare their opposition to migration. For example, a December 2022 Harvard-Harris poll showed that 76 percent of swing-voting independents want the Title 42 border barrier to be preserved, along with 80 percent of Republicans and 79 percent of Democrats. Sixty-seven percent of Hispanics and 77 percent of blacks want the barrier preserved.

Similarly, Americans overwhelmingly dismiss corporate demands for more legal and illegal immigrant workers, even at the threatened cost of higher inflation. By a factor of more than two to one, Americans agree companies “should raise wages and try harder to recruit Americans even if it causes the prices of their products to rise,” said a July 20-22 poll by YouGov.com.

Only 28 percent of registered voters believe immigration has been positive for their local economy, and only 38 percent say immigration is good for the United States, according to an August 12-15 survey of 2,025 registered voters conducted for a pro-migration advocacy group.

Thirty-five percent of the respondents in an August 2022 poll by YouGov said immigration makes the United States “worse off. Thirty-one percent said immigration makes the U.S. “Better off,” according to the July 23-26 poll of 1,500 citizens.

Latino voters show little interest in immigration expansion amid rising inflation and crimes, according to a July-August survey of 2,540 registered Latino voters by two pro-migration advocacy groups. “Immigration reforms” were ranked by Latino voters as the twelfth most important issue after inflation, crime, the economy, healthcare, abortion, rent, and schools, according to the survey

Just 26 percent of people “strongly” endorse the 1950s “Nation of Immigrants” narrative, down from 40 percent in 2018, said an August 2022 poll by Ipsos.

A majority of Americans say Biden is allowing a southern border invasion, according to a July 2022 poll commissioned by the left-of-center, taxpayer-supported National Public Radio (NPR). The 54 percent “Invasion” majority includes 76 percent of Republicans, 46 percent of independents, and even 40 percent of Democrats. Just 19 percent of all respondents — or one in five — said the term is false.

Joel Rose, a pro-migration NPR journalist, lamented the mainstream 3:1 public judgment revealed by the survey of 1,116 adults, saying:

Republican leaders are increasingly framing the situation as an “invasion.” Immigrant advocates say the word has a long history in white nationalist circles, and warn that such extreme rhetoric could provoke more violence against immigrants. Still, the polling shows that the word “invasion” has been embraced by a wide range of Americans to describe what’s happening at the border

Democrats are using their media power to portray the public’s growing concern about the huge scale and civic impact of Biden’s migration as “white nationalism.”

The federal government has long operated an unpopular economic policy of Extraction Migration. This colonialism-like policy extracts vast amounts of human resources from needy countries and uses the imported workers, renters, and consumers to grow Wall Street and the economy.

The migrant inflow has successfully forced down Americans’ wages and also boosted rents and housing prices.

The inflow has also pushed many native-born Americans out of careers in a wide variety of business sectors and contributed to the rising death rate of poor Americans. The population inflow also reduces the political clout of native-born Americans, because it allows elites to divorce themselves from the needs and interests of ordinary Americans.

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