39 percent approve of Trump performance on immigration: Survey

Administration 39 percent approve of Trump performance on immigration: Survey Comments: by Ryan Mancini - 08/03/26 2:09 PM ET Comments: Link copied by Ryan Mancini - 08/03/26 2:09 PM ET Comments: Link copied

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A new poll shows that more Americans do not approve of President Trump’s handling of immigration, a core issue on his political agenda.

The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research found that 39 percent of respondents approve of his handling of immigration — a 10-point decrease from the beginning of his second term — and 58 percent disapprove.

Republicans have decreased their approval of how immigration has been handled, which lowered from 88 percent to 81 percent between the start of Trump’s second term and now. Independents and Democrats had lower opinions at the start of his second term, at 29 percent and 7 percent, respectively.

This unpopularity extends to nearly half of respondents who told pollsters that Trump has “gone too far” in restricting legal immigration, with 47 percent also saying the president has exceeded his authority to deport immigrants lacking permanent legal status who are already in the U.S.

About 3 in 10 say Trump’s actions have been “about right,” while 2 in 10 say he has not gone far enough.

The poll found that about half of Americans “strongly” or “somewhat” disapprove of tactics executed by Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), with only about 3 in 10 saying they “strongly” or “somewhat” approve.

The AP-NORC poll found a partisan split on ICE’s tactics, with 6 in 10 Republicans saying they approve compared to about 20 percent of independents and 4 percent of Democrats.

Disapproval of Trump’s immigration agenda follows more than a year of federal crackdowns in Democratic cities — including Los Angeles and Minneapolis — and at least 10 deaths involving encounters with federal immigration enforcement officers. The crackdown also resulted in the deaths of two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis while immigration officers operated within the city.

ICE announced that it launched operations in New York City, Trump’s birthplace, beginning last week in Queens. New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani (D), who has long been critical of ICE, called for the agency to be abolished after a Mexican immigrant was shot and killed in Houston last month.

Democratic lawmakers have called on ICE to equip its officers with body cameras six months after the Department of Homeland Security said it would do so. These lawmakers have added more urgency to their requests after a Colombian immigrant in Biddeford, Maine, was shot and killed just days after the shooting in Houston.

The AP-NORC survey was conducted July 23-27 and included 1,165 respondents. The margin of error is 3.7 percentage points.

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