Majority Of Republicans Support Immigration Reform, Poll Says

According to a new poll, a healthy majority of Republicans support the immigration reform plan currently pending in the Senate:

new national survey conducted by the Winston Group shows a majority of Republicans support the immigration reform bill.

The survey was commissioned by Americans for Tax Reform (ATR), the National Immigration Forum Action Fund and the Partnership for a New American Economy.

Worth noting is that, “even after hearing opposition arguments, support for reform remains,” said pollster Kirsten Soltis Anderson on a conference call this morning.

The poll also shows strong support for the plan’s treatment of people here in the country illegally where these people receive legal status in exchange or paying fees and fines, not having a criminal record, paying taxes, and getting in the back of the line for citizenship. Ideally, this should be good news for the bill, but the conservative wing of the GOP seems intent on trying to kill this bill like they did with the Bush-era reforms in 2005. Something tells me that, if they succeed in that effort this time, they’ll come to regret it in 2014.

FILED UNDER: Borders and Immigration, Congress, US Politics, ,
Doug Mataconis
About Doug Mataconis
Doug Mataconis held a B.A. in Political Science from Rutgers University and J.D. from George Mason University School of Law. He joined the staff of OTB in May 2010 and contributed a staggering 16,483 posts before his retirement in January 2020. He passed far too young in July 2021.

Comments

  1. john personna says:

    Ah, but it isn’t what people think, remember?

    I believe you’ve argued that unless the issue is the voter’s top concern, Congress can safely ignore them.

  2. Moosebreath says:

    And after similar polls showing the majority of Republicans supported universal background checks before it came time to actually vote on them, I am not holding my breath expecting this to pass, either.

  3. stonetools says:

    @john personna:

    Ah, but it isn’t what people think, remember?

    I believe you’ve argued that unless the issue is the voter’s top concern, Congress can safely ignore them.

    Bingo. What Doug favors certain positions , like immigration reform and same sex marriage, he approvingly cites the polls as reflecting “the will of the American people. ” When the polls favor a position he dosn’t like, the polls aren’t important and don’t truly reflect what the American people really want.
    I’m going to go ahead and predict that the bill will fail, since the same conservative knucke draggers that hate gun safety reform also hate immigrants, and for the same reason-paranoia about losing “their America”. The businesses and farmers who want cheap labor will fight for and get their “guest worker ” provisions, but I’m betting the rest of the bill goes down. Hopefully, if OFA does their stuff, the Republicans will pay a price in 2014.

  4. Caj says:

    Of course they may support it now after they got a shallacking in the polls last November! Pandering and votes are two words which spring to mind right now. The Republican Party must think the voting public especially Latinos have short term memory loss. If they were so into immigration reform why didn’t they do a darn thing all during the Bush years? The Republican Party is so fake on so many fronts they are a joke.

  5. wr says:

    @john personna: “I believe you’ve argued that unless the issue is the voter’s top concern, Congress can safely ignore them. ”

    Yes, but that was completely different. Doug disagreed with the gun bill.

  6. al-Ameda says:

    Looks like they polled a lot of RINOs, doesn’t it?

    And the rebranding continues apace.

  7. rudderpedals says:

    I wonder just how intensely supportive is this well-marbled majority? The big numbers hide more than they reveal, especially the primary electorate.