By Natasha Korecki
66% of likely voters in the midterm elections disapprove of President Joe Biden's handling of immigration, according to a new poll conducted by the Democratic company that has acted as Biden's main political pollster.
The results of the questionnaire, commissioned by the migrant defense group NILC Immigrant Justice Fund and provided for the first time to NBC News, sister network of Noticias Telemundo, are produced a few days after Biden's speech on the state of the union, in the who is expected to lay out his priorities and highlight the achievements of his Administration in the past year, all this in the midst of the ongoing conflict in Ukraine.
According to the poll, 71% said immigration reform should be an extremely or very important priority for the White House and Congress.
President Joe Biden during a meeting in the Oval Office of the White House, Tuesday, February 1, 2022, in Washington. Patrick Semansky / AP
Briannon Gillis, political director of the Immigrant Justice Fund, the advocacy arm of the National Immigration Law Center, argued that the numbers mean voters would welcome Biden taking more aggressive steps before the midterms to overturn the immigration policies of former President Donald Trump.
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“The inaction that we are seeing from the Biden Administration has been a political miscalculation,” Gillis said, urging the President to re-emphasize immigration as a priority in this week's state of the union address.
Biden could take more executive action and return to prioritizing immigration legislation before the midterm elections, Gillis said, but he described the administration as
"excessively cautious"
on immigration issues.
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"We all agree that our immigration system is outdated and in need of reform, but making the necessary changes is not going to happen overnight," White House spokesman Vedant Patel said in a statement.
"This Administration remains committed to working day in and day out to provide relief to migrants and bring our system into the 21st century."
Upon taking office last year, Biden halted construction of Trump's border wall and signed three executive orders that the administration said would reverse the former Republican president's "moral failings."
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It also ended the ban on travel to majority Muslim countries and launched the Family Reunification Task Force whose goal is to reunite families separated at the border under the Trump Administration.
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But Biden's plans have been stymied by the courts or Congress in his other attempts at broader immigration changes.
Pro-immigrant groups have drawn attention to the Administration's recent measure, amid the wave of COVID-19 infections due to the omicron variant, which extends Title 42, imposed in the Trump era and allows asylum seekers be returned under the argument of protecting public health.
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The poll, in which Biden's overall favorability was 41%, suggested broad support for reversing more Trump-era policies, including 52% who said they somewhat or strongly supported ending Title 42 and 53. % who stated that they supported in some way or strongly the cancellation of the 'Stay in Mexico' policy, which forces asylum seekers to remain in this country until their cases are heard by a US immigration court.
The Biden Administration has tried to reverse this measure but its attempts have been stopped by federal judges.
The issue is being considered by the Supreme Court.
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64% of those surveyed were in favor of creating a path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants.
Democrats, who control the White House and both houses of Congress, albeit with slim majorities, have tried to bring about change by trying to include immigration reform measures in a broader legislative package of social policies that Biden called
Build Back Better.
As the House of Representatives moved forward, an archaic Senate rule barred immigration reform measures from being included in a bill that could pass with the support of only Democratic senators, or a simple majority.
Senate rules require 60 votes to pass most types of legislation, and Republican lawmakers have made clear their opposition to Democrats' efforts to overhaul the immigration system.
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Republicans have attacked Biden on this issue since the day he took office - when he proposed a sweeping bill that Senate Republicans called "unworkable" the next day - accusing the president of maintaining a border policy "open," a sentiment echoed over and over again in conservative media coverage.
Biden does not have an open borders policy, and migrant rights groups have instead complained about the administration expanding Title 42 and pushed for Biden to allow more refugees into the country.
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The poll, of 802 likely 2022 voters, was conducted Feb. 10-17 by Impact Research, a company formerly known as ALG polling and founded by John Anzalone, Biden's top political pollster.
(Anzalone was not personally involved in the survey conducted by his company.)
The survey has a margin of error of +/- 3.5%.
In the NILC-commissioned poll, Trump scored much higher with his base on how he handles immigration issues (86% positive) than Biden did with his (54% approval).
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But the two are closer when it comes to independent voters, with Biden at 19% and Trump at 21% approval.
The group argued that this means Biden has room to gain ground with his base without alienating independents.
"The propaganda that's coming out from Republicans about what's going on at the border and the need to keep some of these policies in place is not confirmed by this poll," said Will Dempster, Director of Communications for the Justice Fund for NILC immigrants.
"This is an opportunity for them to take those steps to turn the tide in a way that resonates with voters including independents."
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Gillis argued that a " Democratic
Trifecta
," meaning Democratic control of the White House and Congress, should mean more concrete results.
"The Biden-Harris administration was given a mandate, they made campaign promises and the electorate wants them to keep them and that would be a political victory," Gillis said.