MINNEAPOLIS — Donald Trump won the presidency in 2024 in part by promising to end border crossings and deport criminals. A year into his second term, as immigration agents and protesters skirmish in the streets of the Twin Cities, public sentiment on immigration enforcement appears to be shifting sharply, according to recent polls.
Majorities of voters believe an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent was not justified in shooting a Minneapolis woman, disapprove of ICE’s work and think the agency is making cities less safe, polls show. Trump has been undeterred — his administration flooded Minneapolis with more agents after the shooting, and the president threatened last week to invoke the Insurrection Act.
The clash over ICE comes as Trump and other Republicans fret that their party could lose their narrow control of the House this fall. ICE’s aggressive operations have turned off much of the public and could create a new political liability for the GOP.
Aidan Perzana, 31, opposed the surge of ICE agents into his city last month. He bristled, he said, at the militarized styling of the agents, who drive unmarked vehicles, carry firearms and dress in fatigues, tactical vests and masks. Earlier this month, Perzana watched in horror out his window as an ICE agent shot and killed Renée Good in her vehicle just outside his house.
“I wasn’t expecting it to happen right in front of me, but I’m not surprised it happened,” he said.
The shooting cemented his opposition to ICE, said Perzana, a data engineer for the state who described himself as being on the left. “It doesn’t seem to me like they’re operating sort of within the legal framework that we have set up,” he said.
A poll by CNN found 56 percent of adults did not consider the shooting an appropriate use of force, including 51 percent who said it reflected broader problems with ICE’s operations.
Similarly, a Quinnipiac University poll found 53 percent of registered voters believed the shooting was unjustified and 35 percent believed it was justified. Fifty-seven percent disapproved of the way ICE was enforcing immigration laws.
In an Economist/YouGov survey, 50 percent of U.S. citizens said the shooting was unjustified and 30 percent said it was justified. Far more respondents, 47 percent, said ICE made Americans less safe than the 34 percent who said the agency made Americans safer.
Even before the shooting, the public had a negative impression of ICE and Homeland Security Secretary Kristi L. Noem.
“We’ve seen a slow dripping downward of confidence in ICE [and] the person running it, and then Minneapolis happens,” said Tim Malloy, a polling analyst with Quinnipiac.
Trump has stuck to his strategy. The administration in December launched Operation Metro Surge, sending ICE agents to the Twin Cities in response to investigations into fraud in public benefit programs in the state. Noem sent more agents to the state after Good’s shooting, and Trump on Thursday said if state officials don’t quash protests, he will invoke the Insurrection Act to “quickly put an end to the travesty that is taking place” in Minnesota.
Minneapolis has been rocked by protests since Good was killed, including a Saturday march against immigrants, promoted by Jake Lang, who was charged with assaulting officers at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. Trump pardoned Lang last year along with others accused of participating in the pro-Trump riot.
White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson in a statement said ICE officers are facing more assaults “because of dangerous, untrue smears from elected Democrats.”
“The President campaigned on and won an election based on his promise to carry out the largest mass deportation operation in history — he’s keeping his promise and the American people are appreciative,” she said.
Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey, who has repeatedly urged ICE to leave the city, accused the agency of creating chaos at a field hearing Friday held by Democratic members of Congress.
“This is about political retribution” by Trump, he said. “And we in Minneapolis are suffering the brunt of it right now.”
Videos of Good’s shooting went viral, and large majorities of voters — 82 percent in the Quinnipiac survey — told pollsters they had seen it.
“While you had this initial kind of debate between Republicans and Democrats over framing the issue, people saw it for themselves and made their judgments,” said Carroll Doherty, the former director of political research at the nonpartisan Pew Research Center. “By 20 to 30 points, they either said it was not appropriate or unjustified, and so it was pretty one-sided.”
The public has supported strong border security and deporting criminals, according to polls, but immigration has become less of a concern for voters as the Trump administration has sharply limited border crossings. At the same time, Doherty said, there has been a “slow building backlash against some of the tactics of the immigration crackdown.”
Views on ICE are deeply polarized, with large majorities of Republicans supporting the agency and large majorities of Democrats opposing it. A similar discrepancy shows up over whether the shooting was justified.
Independent voters have sided with Democrats, tipping the overall numbers that show majorities opposing ICE and believing the use of force against Good was inappropriate.
“We’re really, really polarized on this,” said Charles Franklin, the polling director for Marquette University Law School. “That means that ICE’s approval, in one sense, won’t sink much further.”
Unclear is whether Democrats can capitalize on the public’s disapproval of ICE in the midterm elections. The economy, not immigration, is the most important issue, according to polls of voters.
Immigration and ICE create political conundrums for both sides, pollsters said. Republicans support ICE and the president but are less concerned about the issue now that border crossings are down.
While Democrats can leverage opposition to ICE, they run the risk of getting pulled into debates over President Joe Biden’s unpopular handling of the border and “abolish ICE” debates that have divided the party and turned off some centrist voters.
The Economist/YouGov poll found Americans closely divided on abolishing ICE, with 46 percent in favor and 43 percent opposed.
The recent polling has emboldened a growing number of Democrats to more directly condemn ICE, point to the billions of dollars given to the agency under Trump’s sweeping tax and budget bill passed last year and call for a curb on the agency’s power. Until the shooting in Minneapolis, leading Democrats had been hesitant to talk about immigration, even as Trump’s crackdown intensified.
Democrats in 2020 called for a more compassionate approach toward immigration in response to Trump’s first term, but many felt Democrats lost in 2024 in large part because of Biden’s failure to stem a surge of migrants at the U.S.-Mexico border. The party has since failed to coalesce around an alternate immigration plan, hindering its ability to push back on Trump.
Democratic leaders have largely wanted to focus on health care and the cost of living in their effort to win back the House and have urged their candidates and officeholders to avoid being distracted by other issues. But party leaders have recently urged members to lean in to what they view as ICE’s overreach, noting the recent shift in public sentiment.
House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D) has become more forceful in his condemnations of ICE over the past two weeks and called for changes, including barring agents from wearing masks, requiring them to wear body cameras and ensuring they do not have absolute legal immunity.
“Every single one of these people who we see brutalizing the American people, they’re going to be held accountable, one way or the other, in accordance with the law,” Jeffries said last week.
Republican political strategists are happy to see a renewed debate over abolishing ICE. Republicans are focusing on border security while Democrats “embrace radical policies that are electoral poison,” said a statement from Mike Marinella, a spokesman for the National Republican Congressional Committee.
“The radical ‘Abolish ICE’ crusade from far-left Democrats seemed like a relic of the past, but it’s the brand new litmus test for desperate Democrats to get approval from their radical base,” he said.
Scott Clement contributed to this report.
The post Voters oppose ICE amid shootings in Minneapolis appeared first on Washington Post.
