Trump’s immigration policy has been a key part of his agenda. Only a third of Americans think he’s doing a good job at it
President Trump’s immigration policy has been a key part of his agenda, but new polling reveals that only a third of Americans think he’s handling it well.
The latest Reuters/Ipsos poll, released on Tuesday, showed public support for his immigration crackdown had plummeted to its lowest level since he returned to the White House.
Just 38 per cent of respondents think Trump is doing a good job on immigration, according to the poll, down from 39 per cent in January and as high as 50 per cent in the period shortly after Trump returned to the Oval Office.
The polling is in line with other results, including a February Quinnipiac survey, in which 63 per cent of American voters disapproved of the way Immigration and Customs Enforcement was enforcing immigration laws, while just 34 per cent approved.
Fifty-nine per cent of voters in that survey also believed the recent agent-involved shootings in Minneapolis were “a sign of broader problems in the way ICE is operating.”
Trump’s immigration campaign has been heavily scrutinized after federal officers killed American citizens Alex Pretti and Renee Good. The agencies have also faced criticism for a wave of policies that critics say trample on the rights of both immigrants facing arrest and Americans protesting the enforcement actions.
ICE has undergone a massive hiring boom, deploying immigration officers across the country, with concerns that many of these new agents have not been adequately trained.
Todd Lyons, the acting director of ICE; Rodney Scott, who leads Customs and Border Protection; and Joseph Edlow, the director of Citizenship and Immigration Services, were called to appear before the House Committee on Homeland Security last week.
Lyons has faced scrutiny over a memo he signed last year telling ICE officers that they didn’t need a judge’s warrant to forcibly enter a house to arrest a deportee, which went against years of ICE practice and Fourth Amendment protections against illegal searches.
Last week, a federal judge appointed by Donald Trump lambasted the administration for surging federal officers into Minnesota without accounting for basic due process protections for thousands of people they arrested.
Immigration authorities violated their rights by stashing them into a severely overcrowded federal facility without access to attorneys, according to District Judge Nancy Brasel.
“It appears that in planning for Operation Metro Surge, the government failed to plan for the constitutional rights of its civil detainees,” she wrote last Thursday.
Numerous Democrats in Congress have criticized DHS’s enforcement tactics and called on Secretary Kristi Noem to resign or face impeachment. Senate Democrats are now blocking DHS funding until reforms are enacted, such as requiring federal agents to wear body cameras and display identification.
The Reuters/Ipsos poll showed that support for Trump’s immigration approach had fallen particularly sharply among men, who played a significant role in his 2024 election victory.
Trump’s approval rating on immigration among men held close to 50 per cent for much of 2025, but has now collapsed to just 41 per cent. Among women, it has fallen from around 40 per cent to just 35 per cent.
A series of recent poll results have shown the president and his party underwater on all fronts, with many now predicting a ‘blue wave’ in the November mid-term elections.
Trump’s overall approval rating was unchanged at 38 per cent in the poll; his approval on immigration has now reached that level, suggesting it has bottomed out among a core group of supporters.
The poll, conducted online nationwide, included responses from 1,117 U.S. adults and had a three-percentage-point margin of error.
