Poll: Immigration Is a Top Concern for Americans On Both Sides

In this Tuesday, Feb. 7, 2017, photo released by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, foreign nationals are arrested during a targeted enforcement operation conducted by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) aimed at immigration fugitives, re-entrants and at-large criminal aliens in Los Angeles. Advocacy groups said that Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers are rounding up people in large numbers around the country, with roundups in Southern California being especially heavy-handed, as part of stepped-up enforcement under President Donald Trump. (Charles Reed/U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement via AP)

Immigration is a yuge deal, and not just to anyone pulling the lever for anyone with an R next to their name.

According to a new Associated Press poll released on Friday, both Democrat and Republican voters are increasingly concerned about how we’re going to deal with the crisis currently plaguing our southern border:

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An Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research poll conducted shortly before the shutdown began finds that both Republicans and Democrats are far more likely to include immigration in their list of top issues facing the country this year compared with a year ago.

Overall, 49 percent mentioned immigration in an open-ended question as one of the top five problems they hoped the government addresses in 2019. By contrast, 27 percent mentioned immigration in December 2017.

Naturally, Republicans care a lot more about border security than Democrats do, however, the left is seeing a sharp uptick in concern according to AP:

The poll found that 65 percent of Republicans say immigration is one of the top five problems facing the country, up from 42 percent in 2017. Among Democrats, 37 percent cite immigration as a top issue, compared with just 2 in 10 a year ago.

Before anyone gets excited, consider that the right and the left have different ideas as to how to solve the problem. The left wants amnesty while the right wants security. When it comes to President Trump’s promised border wall, 78 percent of Republicans want it while only eight percent of Democrats agree according to AP.

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This gift more steam for the Democrats resistance to Trump’s demand for funding, though Democrats have a mounting problem in front of them in terms of convincing Republicans that a shutdown is bad enough to force the right to capitulate.

As it stands, 84 percent of Republicans support Trump during this shutdown. If Democrats were hoping that a failed tax return would push some Republicans over to their side, then it would appear that Trump is also covering that base as the White House announced earlier Monday that the IRS would still be giving people back their money, shutdown or not.

What’s more, the private sector is flexing its muscles in order to keep national parks like Yellowstone operational and open to the public, further proving that the government is not only unnecessary but also inefficient.

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