Americans' views on immigration take a massive positive swing amid Trump's crackdown
The share of Americans who thought immigration should decrease – 55% – reached a 5-year high point in 2024. This year, it has dropped to 30%, and positive views of immigration have hit a record high of 79%, according to poll results released July 11. The poll surveyed 1,402 Americans between June 2 and 26.
The Trump administration ramped up its promise to carry out widespread deportations in June, sending out masked immigration agents to raid restaurants, farms and hardware stores and touching off widespread protests. He has unveiled a new "Alligator Alcatraz" detention facility for migrants in the Florida Everglades. The administration has faced legal challenges at every turn, bringing it several times to the brink of clashes with judges who have imposed barriers on the scale and tactics of the crackdown.
During former President Joe Biden's administration, Americans' views on immigration took a dip amid a surge of migration and reports of disarray on the southern border.
But this year, even among Republicans, views on immigration have grown significantly rosier – 64% of Republicans now believe immigration is a good thing, a 25-point jump from June of 2024. The fraction of Republicans who think immigration should decrease has fallen from 88% to 48% in that time span.
Trump's immigration policies are broadly unpopular, with just 35% disapproving of his handling of the issue, according to the poll.
The Trump administration faced heavy pushback over its immigration policies in March when it deported hundreds of men to a brutal prison in El Salvador – even though most were Venezuelan. It was forced to return Kilmar Abrego Garcia, a Maryland man from El Salvador who a judge ordered could remain in the U.S., amid an ongoing legal battle.
The Supreme Court has since given the Trump administration the green light to deport people to countries from which they do not originate.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
CNBC
34 minutes ago
- CNBC
Global week ahead: Trade tensions cloud earnings and the G20 heads south
Earnings season always seems to roll around with alarming frequency. The newsroom approaches each quarter with a nervous energy, but this summer it feels especially heightened. Recent market records in both the U.S. and Europe, alongside an unpredictable economic environment, paint a complicated picture for the second half. It all kicks off on Tuesday with America's banking behemoths, as attention switches from the White House back to Wall Street. But U.S. President Donald Trump's policies still loom large, with Goldman Sachs predicting that, this quarter, U.S. earnings will start to show the impact of the tariffs. The investment bank's economists see "conflicting messages on the margin outlook" as companies have only announced modest price increases, despite the cost hikes associated with higher tariffs. Earnings-per-share growth is also set to come under pressure, with Goldman suggesting, "the consensus estimate among analysts sees S&P 500 companies' earnings-per-share growth decelerating to 4% this quarter relative to the same quarter last year — down from 12% in the first quarter." With the banks set to dominate next week — JPMorgan, Citi, Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley and Bank of America are all reporting within just two days — maybe Europe can provide some optimism. As reported by CNBC's Jenni Reid, European banks just recorded their best first half since 1997. Gains were driven by strong investment banking returns — something their U.S. counterparts are also likely to capitalize on — as well as stock rallies based on both deal speculation and actual M&A. As someone who grew up in Cape Town, seeing this year's G20 meetings take place in South Africa makes me pine for the sunshine of the Southern hemisphere. Next week's meeting in Durban between finance ministers and central bank governors comes at an interesting time for the country. An Oval Office meeting between South African President Cyril Ramaphosa and Trump went spectacularly wrong back in May, when the latter, flanked by his South African (now former) right-hand man Elon Musk, made false claims of a "white genocide." It seems tensions have not abated. U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent will skip the meeting altogether, opting to head to Japan instead, according to Reuters. South Africa is also subject to a new 30% tariff rate, the only country in sub-Saharan Africa to be singled out in the latest round of announcements. It does not bode well for the G20 Leaders meeting, due to be held in Gauteng on Nov. 22-23. It remains to be seen if Trump will attend. In May, South Africa's golfing greats — who traveled to the White House with Ramaphosa — failed to win over Trump. But maybe the lure of some of the best courses in the world, along with a South African summer, could see a seasonal change in his mood toward the country later this year.
Boston Globe
an hour ago
- Boston Globe
US aid cuts halt HIV vaccine research in South Africa, with global impact
But the $46 million from the U.S. for the project was disappearing, part of the dismantling of foreign aid by the world's biggest donor earlier this year as President Donald Trump announced a focus on priorities at home. Advertisement South Africa hit hard by aid cuts South Africa has been hit especially hard because of Trump's baseless claims about the targeting of the country's white Afrikaner minority. The country had been receiving about $400 million a year via USAID and the HIV-focused PEPFAR. Now that's gone. Glenda Grey, who heads the Brilliant program, said the African continent has been vital to the development of HIV medication, and the U.S. cuts threaten its capability to do such work in the future. Significant advances have included clinical trials for lenacapavir, the world's only twice-a-year shot to prevent HIV, recently approved for use by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. One study to show its efficacy involved young South Africans. 'We do the trials better, faster and cheaper than anywhere else in the world, and so without South Africa as part of these programs, the world, in my opinion, is much poorer,' Gray said. Advertisement She noted that during the urgency of the COVID-19 pandemic, South Africa played a crucial role by testing the Johnson & Johnson and Novavax vaccines, and South African scientists' genomic surveillance led to the identification of an important variant. Labs empty and thousands are laid off A team of researchers at the University of the Witwatersrand has been part of the unit developing the HIV vaccines for the trials. Inside the Wits laboratory, technician Nozipho Mlotshwa was among the young people in white gowns working on samples, but she may soon be out of a job. Her position is grant-funded. She uses her salary to support her family and fund her studies in a country where youth unemployment hovers around 46%. 'It's very sad and devastating, honestly,' she said of the U.S. cuts and overall uncertainty. 'We'll also miss out collaborating with other scientists across the continent.' Professor Abdullah Ely leads the team of researchers. He said the work had promising results indicating that the vaccines were producing an immune response. But now that momentum, he said, has 'all kind of had to come to a halt.' The BRILLIANT program is scrambling to find money to save the project. The purchase of key equipment has stopped. South Africa's health department says about 100 researchers for that program and others related to HIV have been laid off. Funding for postdoctoral students involved in experiments for the projects is at risk. South Africa's government has estimated that universities and science councils could lose about $107 million in U.S. research funding over the next five years due to the aid cuts, which affect not only work on HIV but also tuberculosis — another disease with a high number of cases in the country. Advertisement Less money, and less data on what's affected South Africa's government has said it will be very difficult to find funding to replace the U.S. support. And now the number of HIV infections will grow. Medication is more difficult to obtain. At least 8,000 health workers in South Africa's HIV program have already been laid off, the government has said. Also gone are the data collectors who tracked patients and their care, as well as HIV counselors who could reach vulnerable patients in rural communities. For researchers, Universities South Africa, an umbrella body, has applied to the national treasury for over $110 million for projects at some of the largest schools. During a visit to South Africa in June, UNAIDS executive director Winnie Byanyima was well aware of the stakes, and the lives at risk, as research and health care struggle in South Africa and across Africa at large. Other countries that were highly dependent on U.S. funding including Zambia, Nigeria, Burundi and Ivory Coast are already increasing their own resources, she said. 'But let's be clear, what they are putting down will not be funding in the same way that the American resources were funding,' Byanyima said. Associated Press writer Michelle Gumede in Johannesburg contributed to this report.
USA Today
an hour ago
- USA Today
Donald Trump threatens to revoke longtime foe Rosie O'Donnell's US citizenship
President Donald Trump unleashed on his longtime foe Rosie O'Donnell, threatening to revoke the left-leaning comedian's U.S. citizenship. In a Truth Social post July 12, Trump said that "because of the fact that Rosie O'Donnell is not in the best interests of our Great Country, I am giving serious consideration to taking away her Citizenship." "She is a Threat to Humanity, and should remain in the wonderful Country of Ireland, if they want her. GOD BLESS AMERICA!" Trump wrote. A rep for O'Donnell directed USA TODAY to her client's statement on Instagram, saying that "nothing else will be said." In March, the infamous former "View" co-host revealed her recent move to Ireland and told fans the political climate following Trump's election inspired her relocation, which took place Jan. 15. "It's been heartbreaking to see what's happening politically and hard for me personally as well," O'Donnell said. "The personal is political, as we all know," adding that "now as we're getting settled, I was ready to post this and to tell everybody what's been going on." O'Donnell and Trump's feud date back to her days on the panel of ABC's "The View," which she co-hosted from 2006 to 2007 and again from 2014 to 2015 before he was elected president. Rosie O'Donnell moves to Ireland amid Trump presidency: 'The personal is political' In her July 12 statement on Instagram, O'Donnell posted a picture of Trump and convicted pedophile Jeffrey Epstein, asking if he is "rattled again? 18 years later and I still live rent-free in that collapsing brain of yours." Epstein, the convicted child sex offender and disgraced multimillionaire financier, died in 2019 and his death is the source of long-standing conspiracy theories and controversy. "You call me a threat to humanity – but I'm everything you fear: a loud woman a queer woman a mother who tells the truth an american who got out of the country b4 u set it ablaze," O'Donnell said in her statement. "You build walls – I build a life for my autistic kid in a country where decency still exists." She added: "You crave loyalty – I teach my children to question power. You sell fear on golf courses – I make art about surviving trauma. You lie, you steal, you degrade – I nurture, I create, I persist." In her open letter to Trump, O'Donnell wrote that "you are everything that is wrong with america – and I'm everything you hate about what's still right with it." "You want to revoke my citizenship? go ahead and try, king joffrey with a tangerine spray tan. i'm not yours to silence i never was," O'Donnell concluded. Later in March, in another lengthy TikTok video, Donnell said she felt "healthier (and) I'm sleeping better without the stress and anxiety over what was happening politically in the country," and because she is not being "singled out by the President of the United States." Contributing: Edward Segarra
