Surprising Takeaways from Latest Harvard/Harris Poll

The monthly Harvard/Harris poll is out, and if you have been watching the protests against immigration enforcement and the vitriol (and violence) directed at ICE agents, you may be surprised: The percentage of American voters polled who identified “immigration” as the issue that matters most personally to them rose compared to last month, and more respondents support deporting criminal illegal aliens than they did in October. Support for deporting all those here illegally, however, slipped in November among Democrats and Independents, though it’s still higher than you might expect.

That survey was conducted by The Harris Poll and HarrisX for the Center for American Political Studies at Harvard University between November 4 and 6 among 2,000 registered voters. The margin of error is +/- 1.99 percentage points.

President Trump’s Approval Rating

In the latest poll, 44 percent of respondents approve of the job Donald Trump is doing as president (27 percent “strongly”), a two-point decline overall from the same polling in October. The 27 percent who strongly support the president, however, has remained constant for the past three months.

Conversely, 51 percent of those polled disapproved of the president’s performance (39 percent strongly), a one-point increase compared with last month.

As with the voters in the Harvard/Harris poll who strongly approve of Trump, the “strong disapproval” crowd has remained in the 36 percent to 39 percent range since March, dipping to 35 percent only once, in April.

Trump remains popular among Republicans (84 percent net approval), men (52 percent net approval), and (interestingly) those aged 35 to 44 (54 percent net approval). He has 51 percent approval vs. 46 percent disapproval rating among whites, and he’s essentially holding serve among respondents aged 25 to 34 (46 percent approve/47 percent disapprove).

Then there’s the bad news for the president.

He’s 28 points underwater with Independents (31 percent approve/59 percent disapprove), 30 points in the red with the youngest voters, aged 18 to 24 (30 percent approve/60 percent disapprove), and a whopping 46 points in the hole among black voters (70 percent approve/24 percent disapprove).

Trump Approval on the Issues

Pocketbook issues are plainly dragging the president’s overall approval ratings down.

Just 41 percent of respondents approve of Trump’s performance on the economy, 40 percent approve of his “tariff and trade policies”, and a mere 39 percent are satisfied with the president’s handling of inflation.

Trump does better when it comes to “quality of life” concerns, like law and order.

The president received his best marks (a 49 percent approval) for “fighting crime in America’s cities” and his third-best appraisal (46 percent approval) for “returning America to its values”.

Then, there’s the 47 percent of respondents who approved of the job Trump is doing on immigration — down two points from October, but still the president’s second-best issue out of nine polled by Harvard/Harris.

Most Important Issues

When asked what they thought were the most important issues facing the United States today, those polled chose the same pocketbook issues that Trump is struggling with: inflation came out on top, the choice of 35 percent of respondents (up three points from October), followed by the “economy and jobs” (33 percent, up four points from last month).

In case you are wondering why you hear the phrase “H-1B” so much these days, look no further than the last response; many respondents would likely agree with my colleague John Miano when he advises that the administration “end”, not “mend”, that nonimmigrant worker category.

“Health care” tied for third place among the issues keeping voters up at night, at 26 percent. That’s up two points from October, but given that congressional Democrats claimed they kept the government closed for 43 days in part over their demands for an extension of Covid-era subsidies to Obamacare, it should come as little surprise.

What may come as a surprise, however, is the issue that tied health care at 26 percent for third place in the top issues for voters: immigration.

As with access to medical treatment, that a two-point rise in a month, which is rather remarkable given that the border is more secure than it’s been in five-plus decades and deportations are proceeding apace.

On the latter point, DHS claims more than two million illegal aliens have either been removed or otherwise left since Trump returned, but given that some eight million entered under the last administration (according to the House Judiciary Committee, which should know), Americans may think they aren’t quite out of the woods yet.

Which brings me to a separate question asked by Harvard/Harris: “Which of these [11] issues is most important to you personally?”

The choices ran the gamut, from “foreign affairs” (1 percent) to “inflation/affordability”, the leader at 48 percent (up five points from October).

“Restoring basic American values of merit and competence” came in second, at 13 percent, followed closely by — you guessed it — “immigration”, the most important issue personally for 10 percent of those voters polled.

That’s a one-point increase for both issues over October, within the margin of error but still significant.

Note that the personal importance of immigration declined two points among GOP voters (from 15 percent in October to 13 percent in November), while it rose one point among both Democrats (to 8 percent) and Independents (also 8 percent).

Popularity of Trump Policies

Of course, “immigration” can mean different things to different voters, from more deportations to fewer. The polling suggests it’s a mix, depending on which aliens are being deported and your political views.

That’s because when they were asked to evaluate 18 of the president’s key policies, the second-most popular (after lowering the price of prescriptions) was “deporting immigrants who are here illegally and have committed crimes”, favored by a whopping 79 percent of respondents (21 percent disapproved).

That’s up one point from when Harvard/Harris polled on the same issues in October, representing a two-point increase in favorability among both Republican voters (from 87 percent to 89 percent) and Independents (from 77 percent to 79 percent).

Democrats held steady in their support for deporting criminal illegal aliens compared to October, at 69 percent.

Deporting “all immigrants who are here illegally”, on the other hand, is still popular overall, just not as popular as deporting criminals — or as it was last month.

Some 54 percent of voters surveyed favored mass deportations in the latest Harvard/Harris poll, down two points from October.

Support slipped among Democrats (to 32 percent from 36 percent in October) and Independents (a six-point drop, to 48 percent in November from 54 percent a month before), but rose five points among GOP voters (to 81 percent compared to 76 percent in October).

Interesting Non-Immigration-Related Responses

I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention some of the interesting non-immigration-related responses in this poll.

First, the police, with a 65 percent favorability rating, are the second most popular institution in this country, trailing only the military (76 percent favorability, but down two points from October).

The favorability of the Supreme Court rose one point, to 49 percent in November, but as only 36 percent of respondents have a negative view of the justices, the Court has a 13-point net favorability among U.S. voters.

Just two political figures had positive favorability ratings: Speaker of the House Mike Johnson (29 percent favorable/27 percent unfavorable, net plus two points) and HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. (45 percent favorable/37 percent unfavorable, net plus eight points).

Note that Johnson’s net favorability rose four points over the shutdown month and RFK Jr.’s favorability increased by six points. Given the ubiquity of both in the media over the past four weeks, it appears that the more voters see these two, the more they like them.

Overall, voters view Israel favorably by three points, 38 percent favorable vs. 35 percent unfavorable, while the Palestinian Authority has a net unfavorability of 25 points, 18 percent viewing it favorably compared to 42 percent who see it unfavorably.

And do you want to guess what Secretary of War Pete Hegseth and New York City Mayor-elect Zohran Mamdani (D) have in common? Both are four points in the red in favorability but beating New York Democrat Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (-14 net negative) by 10 points.

The Best Gauge

The Harvard/Harris poll is, in my opinion, the best moving gauge for testing voters’ perceptions for two reasons: (1) it’s run by reputable pollsters; and (2) they ask (more or less) the same questions each month.

Immigration remains among President Trump’s better issues, and support for deporting criminal illegal aliens is high and climbing. To boost the favorability of its immigration policies overall, however, the administration should be ready to counter perceptions created by its political opponents in the media and agitators in the streets.