The number of Americans in support of a border wall is growing amidst the surge in illegal migrants coming through the U.S.-Mexico border. This was confirmed in a national telephone and online survey by Rasmussen Reports and NumbersUSA.
The survey finds that 67% of 2022 midterm voters want the government to build a wall or set up other forms of barriers to curb illegal immigration.
According to the survey, 89% of Republican midterm voters said that increasing physical barriers at the southern border was the right move, with 49% of their Democratic counterparts agreeing with them. 69% of voters with no affiliation to either of the two major parties said physical barriers at the U.S.-Mexico border are at least somewhat important.
Two-thirds want border wall and E-Verify to slow illegal immigration https://t.co/msxXqaVHOL
— Rasmussen Reports (@Rasmussen_Poll) December 2, 2022
The survey also finds that 58% of U.S. midterm voters believe the government is doing too little to reduce visitor overstays and illegal border crossings. More than 50% of voters say President Joe Biden’s administration is doing a poor job of handling the issue of illegal immigration, with 20% giving the administration a rating of good.
This comes barely two weeks after a federal judge ended the Trump-era border policy known as Title 42. The Trump administration created the policy during the early days of the pandemic. Title 42 allowed border enforcement agents to swiftly expel illegal migrants caught entering the country, even if they were asylum seekers.
Head of the National Border Patrol Council, Brandon Judd, told the New York Post that ending Title 42 would increase the number of people trying to enter the country illegally.
“Now that Title 42 goes away, we can expect that the Venezuelan population is going to go way back up there,” he added. “And for every other population that we were exercising Title 42 on, we can expect a complete explosion.”
The Biden administration opted against retaining the policy despite a record number of illegal immigrants coming through the southern border. Nearly 2.4 million illegal migrants were stopped at the southern border in the 2022 fiscal year. The figure showed a 37% increase from the previous fiscal year.
