A recent survey on legal immigration by Pulse Opinion Research suggests that those Democrats who voted for Donald Trump may be hard to woo back to the party of their past. in fact, those Democrats who voted for Claire McCaskill but who also voted for Donald Trump want deeper cuts in legal immigration than do moderate Republicans.
By a 64-23 percent margin, the Trump-McCaskill people favored a a Senate bill that would allow immigrants to bring in their spouse and minor children but would end migration of extended family as is the current practice. Those identified as “Democrats & Independents” favor ending the extended family benefit by a 77-12 percent margin. Even union households favor ending the benefit by a nearly 2-1 margin.
On the question of a House bill cutting legal immigration numbers by 40 percent across the board, Trump Democrats and Independents overwhelmingly supported it, again in much stronger numbers than moderate Republicans.
Those surveyed were asked whether it was better to raise pay until businesses can attract Americans without jobs even if it causes prices to rise, or whether it was better for the government to continue to automatically bring in new immigrants each year to keep the costs down. By a 67-12 percent margin, Missourians preferred the first of the options.
On the question of whether businesses should be required to try harder to recruit and train people from those groups with the highest unemployment or should the government continue to bring in new immigrants to compete for the jobs, again the numbers were overwhelmingly in favor of the former option: 74-9 percent.
Currently, the United States allows about one million immigrants a year to obtain lifetime work visas. Participants were given a range of choices as to what the tight number should be. 25 percent said “None.” Another 22 percent said 250,000. Only 24 percent thought the number should remain at the current figure or higher.
The answers make one wonder how the United States ever devised a system so deeply unpopular. In the era of social media and citizen journalism, it is unlikely that Congress could pass legislation like this again.
