Immigration is a Higher Priority for Americans Than it Was a Year Ago

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Immigration is a higher priority for Americans saying it should be a top focus for the U.S. government in 2025, as the country heads toward a new Republican administration in which President-elect Donald Trump has promised the mass deportations of migrants and an end to birthright citizenship.

About half of U.S. adults named immigration and border topics in an open-ended question that asked respondents to share up to five issues they want the government to work on this year, according to a December poll from The Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. That’s up from about one-third who mentioned the topic as a government priority in an AP-NORC poll conducted the previous year.

The issue of immigration has risen in salience across the board — among Democrats and Republicans, men and women, and adults both young and old. But Republicans, in particular, have converged around this issue in recent years. About 7 in 10 Republicans say immigration or a U.S.-Mexico border wall should be a top focus, up from 45% just two years ago.

This means that Trump will return to the White House with his base, and much of the country, interested in his signature issue. That’s a marked contrast to when he left Washington four years ago with his successor, Democrat Joe Biden, offering a more welcoming posture toward migrants.

But even with the widespread uptick in concern about immigration, that issue is still overshadowed by economic concerns. About three-quarters of Americans want the government to focus on addressing broad economic concerns, similar to the past few years. There’s a range of economic issues Americans want addressed — about 3 in 10 referenced general economic issues, a similar share pointed to inflation, and roughly 1 in 10 mentioned either unemployment or taxes.

About one-third of Americans identify foreign policy as an important issue, with health care issues and politics — both broadly identified — close behind.

California, the state that would be most affected by a mass deportations