CNN senior data reporter Harry Enten said Tuesday that foreign-born voters were favoring former President Donald Trump over President Joe Biden.
Enten cited data from two recent polls conducted by CNN and SSRS that show Trump leading Biden by 3% among “U.S voters born outside the country.” “CNN News Central” co-host Kate Bolduan called Trump’s rhetoric on immigration “harsh” and “extreme,” to which Enten pointed out that Trump is not suffering at the polls on the topic.
“I think a lot of Democrats are saying, ‘Oh, look at Donald Trump, look at what we call anti-immigration rhetoric. There’s going to be some backlash,’ I’m not quite sure that’s exactly right, and I’ve been keeping a track on this,” Enten told Bolduan. “So this is who US voters born outside of the country, so you know, people who might be born in France, people who might be born in Mexico, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera, who did they prefer for president?”
“Well, this is quite something. It’s a number that always seems to surprise me no matter how often I look at it,” Enten continued. “In fact, they slightly, more of them support Donald Trump at 47% than Joe Biden at 44%. Again, this is a change from where we were in 2020 because those who voters were born outside the United States preferred Joe Biden. But in this case, no sign of a backlash, Kate, at this point.”
Only 33.4% of voters approve of Biden’s handling of immigration, according to the RealClearPolling average of polls from March 22 to May 21, while 62.8% disapprove of his handling of the issue. Border Patrol had 1.6 million encounters in fiscal year 2021, 2.2 million in fiscal year 2022 and 2 million in fiscal year 2023, with 1.1 million encounters to date in fiscal year 2024, according to Customs and Border Protection data.
Enten also discussed a Marquette University poll showing Trump leads Biden by 27% on handling immigration.
Read: Florida Sen. Marco Rubio Rips Border-Vetting Process After Illegal Shoots 2 NYPD Cops
“No matter how you phrase it, you will see that more voters today trust former President Trump over President Biden, but the margins can change depending on how it is,” Enten told Bolduan. “So this is a better job on border security and immigration, which tends to be one of former President Trump’s best questions.”
“But I think the key thing here, Kate, to look at is the timeline and look at the trend line here, because back in June of 2020 Biden was actually trusted more on the question of border security and immigration by a single point. Look at where we are in May of 2024,” Enten continued. “My goodness gracious, look at this huge jump that Donald Trump has gotten. He is now ahead on this issue by 27 percentage points. So it’s not just that immigration is more at the top of voters’ minds than it was four years ago, it’s that who they trust on the issue has changed tremendously.”
First published by the Daily Caller News Foundation.
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