Foreign born voters in US increasingly siding with GOP on immigration policy

Though Democrats consider themselves to be the undisputed champion of minority groups, immigrants, and anyone not traditionally aligned with the GOP, according to new polling, there is one critical issue facing the country that upends that theory in a surprising way.

As Fox News reports, a massive shift from Democrat to Republican has occurred among immigrants in America, and it appears that the issue of illegal migration is responsible.

Data reveals shift

According to data gleaned from the 2020 election cycle and analyzed by American National Election Studies (ANES), voters born in a country other than the United States tended to side with Democrats over Republicans on immigration, doing so by a margin of 58% to 24%.

Just four years later, a notable change had taken hold, with the same data set revealing that 45% of voters born elsewhere who participated in the 2024 presidential contest indicated a belief that the GOP was better on the issue of immigration, while 30% chose the Democrats.

The Democrat-to-Republican shift among immigrants was more substantial than a minor yet similar change in the broader electorate.

According to Daron Shaw, a member of the Fox News Decision Team, chalks the situation up to the fact that the immigrant group in question began so heavily tilted toward Democrats, and therefore, “there’s more room for the to shift.”

Shaw also opined that candidate-now-President Donald Trump persuasively combined the issues of immigration and border security, whereas in the past, they were viewed by many as separate propositions.

Vibe change afoot

As Newsweek notes, immigrant voters have undergone a noticeable change in attitude about arrivals who are in the U.S. illegally.

Back in 2020, net favorability in that dynamic was at +23, but now it stands at -6, a staggering change within the short span of four years.

Support among the broader electorate for Trump’s deportation plans remains strong, with a YouGov/CBS News poll from early June showing 54% approval, beating his ratings on inflation and the economy.

With that said, however, there does seem to be some disagreement among voters as to the proper targets of sweeping deportation initiatives.

Whereas some voters believe all illegal immigrants are fair game, others believe that enforcement should be aimed primarily at criminal aliens.

Perhaps in acknowledgment of the above differences of opinion as well as the difficult economic implications of mass deportation in certain industries, Trump recently announced his desire for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to curtail workplace raids centered on the agriculture and hospitality sectors, as The Hill reports.

Explaining the pivot, Trump said, “Our great Farmers and people in the Hotel and Leisure business have been stating that our very aggressive policy on immigration is taking very good, long time workers away from them, with those jobs being almost impossible to replace,” but whether this is a temporary stop-gap or a permanent change, only time will tell.