New Elon Poll shows partisan division on public opinion regarding immigration enforcement and consequences of tariffs. The survey was conducted Feb. 6 to 11 and the dataset included 1,000 adults 18 and older.
The poll found 53% of Americans surveyed support mass deportations of people who immigrated to the country illegally. Republicans support mass deportations at 89% and older Americans support at 60%. The poll found 57% of Democrats and 42% of Black Americans were the groups with the highest rate of opposition.
Respondents were also split on approving or disapproving the job President Donald Trump is doing, with 45% approving and 41% disapproving. However, when split up by party, 88% of Republicans said they approved of his job and 75% of Democrats said they disapproved.
Jason Husser, director of Elon Poll, said this partisan divide is not new and has been a pattern since about 2004.
“What we're seeing now is that being ramped up even further, where almost nothing Trump does is overall bad among his base, and almost nothing he does is right among those who are opposed to him,” Husser said. “That is a trend that is, I think, the biggest pattern to pay attention to in the last 20 years of American history.”
The poll also found that even when respondents had a low attitude toward something in general, their opinions change once it becomes an issue that directly affects them.
“What we found is even among people who support mass deportations, when we ask them, ‘Do you know someone personally who's worried about being deported?’ What we're finding is the majority of people who said yes, they do know someone, don't want to see that person deported,” Husser said. “It's much like the phenomenon which person really dislikes Congress as a whole, but they might like their local member of Congress.”
Survey respondents were also split on their opinions of the consequences of tariffs on the price of goods and impacts on businesses. While 45% of respondents said they feel tariffs will increase the price of goods significantly — or over 10% — 36% said they felt it would increase the price between 5 and 10% — yet Husser said there are still partisan differences on tariffs.
“In the net overall, we're seeing attitudes towards tariffs break down what one might imagine along partisan lines, Democrats tend to find almost all things about tariffs bad,” Husser said. “Republicans are acknowledging that, yes, there will be some inflationary effects of tariffs, but they're seeing it owes a whole is something that's largely a good thing rather than a bad thing.”
The Elon Poll found 50% of respondents felt there would be a negative impact on small businesses from higher tariffs, 19% said there would be a positive impact, 18% were unsure and 12% said there would be little or no impact.
But, respondents were more split in terms of impacts of tariffs on jobs and manufacturing within the country. The poll found 50% of respondents said it was likely or very likely that production of goods in the U.S. will grow and be less reliant on foreign imports, and 34% said that was unlikely or very unlikely. Forty-four percent said there will likely or very likely be more job opportunities in the U.S. and 38% that is very unlikely or unlikely.
More people also would prefer to round up or down to a higher value coin and stop production of pennies. The one cent coin costs over three cents to make and only 32% of respondents said they find pennies useful, compared to the 51% who would prefer to round and the 17% who were unsure. Husser said recently several politicians have talked about getting rid of the penny for this reason.
“The penny has been, in some ways, this sort of touch point about government efficiency versus government providing services for all Americans for a long time now,” Husser said.
The next Elon Poll, which is planned to come out in the next couple of weeks, is a statewide poll focused on the new general assembly elected in November and the relationship between a new governor and a general assembly that no longer has a Republican supermajority. Later on in the semester there will be another nationwide poll on a topic that hasn't been determined yet and there'll be a poll in the summer focused on college sports.