Voters Rate Illegal Immigration As Congress' Top Concern

Following a record-long government shutdown over an inability to reach an agreement on border wall spending, even more voters want to see Congress lean in to dealing with illegal immigration. However, they’re less confident these days that President Trump and the new Democratic majority in the House can work together to achieve that goal.

The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone and online survey finds that 35% of all Likely U.S. Voters believe illegal immigration is the issue the new Congress should deal with first. In a distant second, half as many (17%) want Congress to emphasize health care, while another 16% think the focus should be on Trump’s impeachment. This is a shift from just after November’s midterm elections, when 29% wanted Congress to address illegal immigration first, while nearly as many (24%) thought it should focus on health care.

Support for moving first on spending and the deficit inched up slightly from nine percent (9%) in November to 11% today. In single digits is support for focusing primarily on economic fairness (8%) and gun control (3%) and infrastructure (5%). Two percent (2%) opt for something else. (To see survey question wording, click here.)

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The survey of 1,000 Likely Voters was conducted on January 30-31 by Rasmussen Reports. The margin of sampling error is +/- 3 percentage points with a 95% level of confidence. Field work for all Rasmussen Reports surveys is conducted by Pulse Opinion Research, LLC. See methodology.