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How immigration debates are shaping midterm elections · This Week On ICE

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  [music]
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  SPEAKER_01: Hello and welcome to This Week On ICE for October 7th, 2026.
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_01: I'm Kelly Kimmel.
• 0:12
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm Matthew Kendrick.
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  SPEAKER_01: We are officially less than a month away from the midterm elections that have loomed
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  SPEAKER_01: over our coverage all year.
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  SPEAKER_01: And as you all but certainly have heard already,
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  SPEAKER_01: the Democrats are looking strong enough to seize control of both houses of Congress.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_01: That's not to mention dozens of governor and state legislature races
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  SPEAKER_01: that could also contribute to limiting President Trump's agenda.
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  SPEAKER_01: But do voters want Democrats to take action on immigration?
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  SPEAKER_01: Or are they sending Washington a different message about their priorities?
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  SPEAKER_01: Matt is here to dive into what polling can tell us and where it falls short.
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_00: Then, the White House is denying it plans to send ICE or FBI agents
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  SPEAKER_00: to monitor polling places during the election.
• 0:53
  SPEAKER_00: But the mere threat is having an effect already.
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_00: Kelly will dive into whether a chilling effect is falling across the electorate
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  SPEAKER_00: and what it might mean in November.
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  SPEAKER_00: Stick with us.
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  SPEAKER_01: Matt, let's start with the top line numbers.
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  SPEAKER_01: What are the pollsters telling us about how the election is shaping up?
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  SPEAKER_00: Donald Trump has the worst presidential approval rating going into
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  SPEAKER_00: a midterm election since 1990.
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  SPEAKER_00: And yeah,
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  SPEAKER_00: I like to use Nate Silver's Polling analysis because he pulls together dozens
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  SPEAKER_00: of different polls,
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  SPEAKER_00: weights them according to certain reliability metrics,
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  SPEAKER_00: and then gives you a spread, a range of numbers.
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  SPEAKER_00: So right now,
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  SPEAKER_00: his best guess is that Donald Trump's approval rating
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  SPEAKER_00: among registered voters falls somewhere around 38%.
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  SPEAKER_00: There are polls that would put that down to maybe 31%.
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  SPEAKER_00: There are polls that could put that as high as like 43 percent.
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  SPEAKER_00: 43 percent is a pretty normal place for a president to be going into their midterm election.
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  SPEAKER_00: I do want to add a big caveat, though, which I used to work in polling.
• 2:01
  SPEAKER_00: I used to work in a very specific kind of polling, which is called high frequency.
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  SPEAKER_00: That means we do lots of polls every day on the Internet.
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  SPEAKER_00: And when this came in around 2014 to 2016,
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  SPEAKER_00: there was a lot of buzz about it and how accurate it could be.
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  SPEAKER_00: But I think what we're finding is that
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  SPEAKER_00: while certainly old school pollsters like Gallup that use phones
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  SPEAKER_00: to contact their respondents and collect sort of this slow aggregation of data,
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  SPEAKER_00: those have their problems.
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  SPEAKER_00: So does this high frequency polling.
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  SPEAKER_00: Nate Silver, I know he's somewhat controversial.
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  SPEAKER_00: I think he's really good, especially around this stuff.
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  SPEAKER_00: So let's look at him.
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  SPEAKER_00: And as we look down ballot,
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  SPEAKER_00: there's a YouGov poll that I love that showed that Democrats hold a 14-point lead
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  SPEAKER_00: among likely voters.
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  SPEAKER_00: That means that about 52% of the respondents in this YouGov poll But all of that
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  SPEAKER_00: to say, like you said, Democrats are almost certain to take the House.
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  SPEAKER_00: Quite likely to take the Senate, and then the margin is how big or how small that is.
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  SPEAKER_00: And I think what we really need to look at,
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  SPEAKER_00: therefore,
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  SPEAKER_00: for the interests of our listeners is specifically, is immigration having an effect?
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  SPEAKER_00: And if so, what effect?
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  SPEAKER_00: And how are people feeling about that?
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  SPEAKER_01: Mm-hmm.
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  SPEAKER_00: If you won't mind,
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  SPEAKER_00: I know I'm rambling on here a little bit,
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  SPEAKER_00: but there's a really good polling average, again,
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  SPEAKER_00: from RealClearPolitics this time,
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  SPEAKER_00: where they specifically look at immigration,
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  SPEAKER_00: and they say that 43% of voters in their aggregate approve of President Trump's job
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  SPEAKER_00: on immigration, while 54% disapprove.
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  SPEAKER_00: So that's a 10-point deficit.
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  SPEAKER_00: But notice that that is less than the Democrats' generic ballot, right?
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  SPEAKER_00: Basically,
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  SPEAKER_00: there are some people who are going to vote for Democrats,
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  SPEAKER_00: but don't necessarily think that Donald Trump is doing a bad job on immigration.
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  SPEAKER_00: And that's going to become a theme as we go through these numbers here.
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  SPEAKER_01: So overall, his approval rating is the lowest of the low.
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  SPEAKER_01: But among the specific issue areas,
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  SPEAKER_01: immigration has higher approval ratings against other issues.
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  SPEAKER_00: Yes.
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  SPEAKER_00: In fact,
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  SPEAKER_00: while he is underwater on almost every issue,
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  SPEAKER_00: he is the least underwater on immigration.
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  SPEAKER_00: So again, I'm going to turn back to Nate Silver.
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  SPEAKER_00: He's done this big aggregate.
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  SPEAKER_00: He's looking at four big issues, immigration, trade, economy, inflation.
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  SPEAKER_00: Immigration, he's underwater by about 12 points by Nate Silver's reckoning.
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  SPEAKER_00: Trade, he's underwater by about 28 points.
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  SPEAKER_00: Economy underwater by 32 points, and inflation, he's nearly 50 points underwater.
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  SPEAKER_00: That is an overwhelming signal that his inability
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  SPEAKER_00: to control inflation is really affecting voters and really pushing people in
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  SPEAKER_00: the wrong direction,
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  SPEAKER_00: including folks in his own party,
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  SPEAKER_00: some of whom will end up voting for Republicans anyway
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  SPEAKER_00: because they're party loyalists.
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  SPEAKER_00: All of this kind of makes me personally feel pretty depressed
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  SPEAKER_00: because all we've done all year,
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  SPEAKER_00: you and I,
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  SPEAKER_00: is talk about the horrible abuses,
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  SPEAKER_00: the unconscionable conditions that immigrants are facing,
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  SPEAKER_00: the children,
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  SPEAKER_00: the innocent children who are being forced to confront immigration judges
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  SPEAKER_00: on their own,
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  SPEAKER_00: being kept in these awful conditions, sometimes separated from their parents.
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  SPEAKER_00: And yet that is not what voters are upset about.
• 5:49
  SPEAKER_01: Mm-hmm.
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  SPEAKER_01: What gives me a little bit of hope is that these elections are a bit of a package deal, right?
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  SPEAKER_01: There are actually very few issues that are being voted on
• 5:59
  SPEAKER_01: at these different elections at the polls that involve immigration.
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  SPEAKER_01: I'm curious if it may well be that the mass disapproval
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  SPEAKER_01: of inflation right now Will ultimately tip the line to influence Democratic parties
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  SPEAKER_01: or influence Congress to push more on other things like immigration if there is
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  SPEAKER_01: a Democratic majority in both houses of Congress.
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  SPEAKER_01: Does that make sense?
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  SPEAKER_00: I see what you mean.
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  SPEAKER_00: And I think that that's not an unreasonable place to be.
• 6:28
  SPEAKER_00: I hope that it ends up that way.
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  SPEAKER_00: But just thinking through,
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  SPEAKER_00: if I'm putting myself in the seat of a staffer and I'm advising a congressperson,
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  SPEAKER_00: a senator,
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  SPEAKER_00: on what should be your priorities here if you win the majority,
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  SPEAKER_00: what should you try and tackle first?
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  SPEAKER_00: Even though I really do care about immigration on a personal level,
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  SPEAKER_00: I would still tell them, you need to get inflation under control.
• 6:52
  SPEAKER_00: Or they're going to throw you out, right?
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_00: That's the message that I think voters are sending in this election if they do elect
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  SPEAKER_00: a Democratic Congress in the Democratic Senate.
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  SPEAKER_00: Trump's promises on the economy fell through.
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  SPEAKER_00: That's what people feel in their wallet.
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  SPEAKER_00: They might see ugly images of migration enforcement on TV,
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  SPEAKER_00: but how many people sitting in a nice suburb,
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  SPEAKER_00: Evergreen,
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  SPEAKER_00: Colorado,
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  SPEAKER_00: are seeing migrants beat up and thrown in jail or are seeing the kind
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  SPEAKER_00: of violence like we saw in Minneapolis or more recently in Texas and Maine?
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  SPEAKER_00: It's pretty small, I would say.
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  SPEAKER_00: So I think that the danger here
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  SPEAKER_00: Democrats will read the numbers and make the politically astute,
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  SPEAKER_00: if cynical,
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  SPEAKER_00: choice to not push that hard on immigration and instead push much harder on
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  SPEAKER_00: the economy.
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  SPEAKER_00: And again, if I'm in their chair, I'd probably do the same thing.
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  SPEAKER_00: I hate to say it, but that's my cynical take.
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_01: Sure, absolutely.
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  SPEAKER_01: And just to underscore this point here,
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  SPEAKER_01: when it comes to issues on immigration,
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  SPEAKER_01: it may be a higher approval rating compared to other issues.
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  SPEAKER_01: There is growing public concern over government corruption overall.
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  SPEAKER_01: There was a Gallup poll reporting that 89% of of Americans view corruption
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  SPEAKER_01: as widespread ahead of midterm elections.
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  SPEAKER_01: And I do believe there's ample evidence of corruption
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  SPEAKER_01: within Trump's immigration crackdown, within immigration enforcement.
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  SPEAKER_01: And that still is the lining here,
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  SPEAKER_01: be it a silver lining or not,
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  SPEAKER_01: that may influence what happens after midterm elections.
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  SPEAKER_01: Obviously, polling is still ongoing.
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  SPEAKER_01: We have yet to actually know what the results are of these midterm elections.
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  SPEAKER_01: But the overall distaste for corruption across the board,
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  SPEAKER_01: including when it comes to the immigration apparatus here in the United States,
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  SPEAKER_01: it gives me some pause.
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  SPEAKER_00: I hadn't considered that angle before.
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  SPEAKER_00: But you're absolutely correct that the government is spending Millions and millions
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  SPEAKER_00: of dollars,
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  SPEAKER_00: if not billions,
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  SPEAKER_00: on no-bid contracts,
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  SPEAKER_00: on contracts for CoreCivic and GEO,
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  SPEAKER_00: these private companies that run the detention centers and make their money
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  SPEAKER_00: by subjecting detainees to human misery.
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  SPEAKER_00: They're paying millions of dollars to countries in Central America and Africa that we know of.
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  SPEAKER_00: We know that they have deals with other countries for third-party deportation.
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  SPEAKER_00: We've only been able to run down the money in a few of those cases.
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  SPEAKER_00: So I think that you're right that there maybe is a message here that you could say,
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  SPEAKER_00: OK,
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  SPEAKER_00: we're going after corruption and we're going after this waste of your money, right?
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  SPEAKER_00: You work so hard.
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  SPEAKER_00: Inflation is eating away at your savings.
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  SPEAKER_00: Every single week you go to the grocery store and your bill goes up a little bit.
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  SPEAKER_00: Gas is through the roof.
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  SPEAKER_00: You're feeling terrible.
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  SPEAKER_00: And look what the administration is spending your money on.
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_00: So I think that you're right, that that might be the way in.
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  SPEAKER_00: And I think that it shows that your political savvy probably exceeds my own
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  SPEAKER_00: in this case, where I was just like, yeah, fuck it, work on the economy.
• 9:47
  SPEAKER_00: You figured out a way to get where you wanted to go.
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  SPEAKER_01: I'm curious about the approval ratings for smaller topics within immigration.
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  SPEAKER_01: How do Americans overall approve of things like third-party deportation, of ICE?
• 9:59
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
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  SPEAKER_01: Of the kind of people ICE is deporting.
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  SPEAKER_01: What is the overall sentiment nationally right now?
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
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  SPEAKER_00: So for this, I turned to YouGov again.
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_00: They're another high-frequency pollster, like the company I worked for.
• 10:10
  SPEAKER_00: I did not work for YouGov.
• 10:11
  SPEAKER_00: I worked for a company called Morning Consult.
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_00: This came in October 6th.
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_00: It was published on October 6th.
• 10:16
  SPEAKER_00: ICE has a 48% disapproval rating and a 36% approval rating.
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  SPEAKER_00: I think that's pretty clearly partisan, right?
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_00: Mm-hmm.
• 10:25
  SPEAKER_00: Most Republicans are probably pretty happy with ICE.
• 10:27
  SPEAKER_00: Most Democrats and a lot of independents are unhappy with ICE.
• 10:31
  SPEAKER_00: And then about 10% of people have no opinion or don't know.
• 10:36
  SPEAKER_00: And so that's pretty clear.
• 10:38
  SPEAKER_00: You also brought up third-party deportation.
• 10:40
  SPEAKER_00: This is another YouGov poll.
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  SPEAKER_00: It's slightly older.
• 10:43
  SPEAKER_00: This survey was conducted on October 2nd, but quite high number of adults.
• 10:47
  SPEAKER_00: So about 6,000 people, 6,500 people took this survey.
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  SPEAKER_00: A slim majority, 53%.
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_00: said that the U.S.
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  SPEAKER_00: should not be able to deport immigrants to prisons in foreign countries
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  SPEAKER_00: that they're not from.
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  SPEAKER_00: So they're against that explanation of third party deportation.
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  SPEAKER_00: And let's, again,
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  SPEAKER_00: another caution when we're dealing with polling,
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  SPEAKER_00: we just have to really understand the limits of it.
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  SPEAKER_00: The phrasing matters.
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_00: The phrasing matters so much in these questions.
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  SPEAKER_00: So let me read you the verbatim question again.
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  SPEAKER_00: Do you think that the U.S.
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  SPEAKER_00: should or should not be able to deport immigrants to prisons in foreign countries
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  SPEAKER_00: that they're not from?
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  SPEAKER_00: And that leads to a slim majority disapproving, only 27%.
• 11:29
  SPEAKER_00: Say that the U.S. should be able to do that.
• 11:32
  SPEAKER_00: I think that if we were to change that and use
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  SPEAKER_00: a jargony term like third-party deportation, those numbers would change.
• 11:38
  SPEAKER_00: I think if we were to phrase that in a way that was a little more...
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  SPEAKER_00: It had a little more pathos.
• 11:50
  SPEAKER_00: That would probably make more people disapprove.
• 11:52
  SPEAKER_00: So let's just be cautious about that.
• 11:54
  SPEAKER_00: The other thing I want to mention is you always have to account for the margin of error.
• 11:58
  SPEAKER_00: Rule of thumb, that's going to land between 2% and 3% in almost every survey.
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  SPEAKER_00: So when you see 53%, that could really be 49%, 50%.
• 12:07
  SPEAKER_00: Or it could be 56%.
• 12:09
  SPEAKER_00: There's this range you have to consider.
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  SPEAKER_00: It's especially important when you're looking at close issues.
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  SPEAKER_00: If I see someone that's 48-52, that's a statistical tie.
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  SPEAKER_00: That's within the margin of error.
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  SPEAKER_00: But yeah, to your point, the third-party deportation is not well supported.
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  SPEAKER_00: I don't quite know...
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  SPEAKER_00: How that would break down in terms of the salience,
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  SPEAKER_00: in terms of how much they care about third-party deportation.
• 12:36
  SPEAKER_00: You might think something is bad but not really want to do anything about it, right?
• 12:40
  SPEAKER_00: And then again,
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  SPEAKER_00: if we look at the crosstabs,
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  SPEAKER_00: are you Republican or Democrat,
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  SPEAKER_00: 80% of Democrats say you shouldn't be able to do third party deportation compared
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  SPEAKER_00: to just 23% of Republicans.
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  SPEAKER_00: But I will say I actually found it very interesting that only 52%
• 12:53
  SPEAKER_00: of Republicans said that you should be able to deport people
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  SPEAKER_00: to conduct third party deportation.
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  SPEAKER_00: So that means that a good quarter of the Republican Party just isn't sure
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  SPEAKER_00: whether this is the right thing to do.
• 13:06
  SPEAKER_00: I thought that was kind of interesting as well.
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  SPEAKER_00: And then you asked about one more thing.
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  SPEAKER_00: Remind me what the last bit was?
• 13:12
  SPEAKER_01: Well, the last thing was something that I hadn't brought up,
• 13:14
  SPEAKER_01: but I wanted to mention now is surveillance.
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  SPEAKER_01: I mean, when I think of technological surveillance,
• 13:20
  SPEAKER_01: it's probably one of the greatest emerging bipartisan issues.
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  SPEAKER_01: No matter what party you're on, I think Americans are generally pro-privacy.
• 13:29
  SPEAKER_01: I'm curious here.
• 13:31
  SPEAKER_01: ICE and immigration enforcement generally,
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  SPEAKER_01: they're adopting quite a lot of surveillance tactics,
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  SPEAKER_01: things from like Palantir Technologies,
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  SPEAKER_01: Flock Cameras,
• 13:40
  SPEAKER_01: the blending of government information with private contractors and companies.
• 13:47
  SPEAKER_01: I'm wondering here, what do voters make of ICE surveillance tactics?
• 13:51
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, that's such a good question.
• 13:52
  SPEAKER_00: So with specifically addressing your question about FLOC, I found another YouGov survey.
• 13:57
  SPEAKER_00: This one's, again, slightly older, from August 24th.
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  SPEAKER_00: They asked,
• 14:01
  SPEAKER_00: do you support or oppose the use of data from license plate readers,
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  SPEAKER_00: aka FLOC, by Immigration and Customs Enforcement to track undocumented immigrants?
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  SPEAKER_00: 40% said they strongly oppose it, and just 20% said they strongly support it.
• 14:17
  SPEAKER_00: Let me add another caveat.
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  SPEAKER_00: When you see these gradients where it's like strongly opposed,
• 14:22
  SPEAKER_00: mildly opposed,
• 14:23
  SPEAKER_00: no opinion,
• 14:24
  SPEAKER_00: mildly support, strongly support, you always want to look at those extremes, right?
• 14:28
  SPEAKER_00: Like I think that's where you really get the most data.
• 14:31
  SPEAKER_00: So again,
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_00: to your point that you made,
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  SPEAKER_00: I think Americans are pretty anti-surveillance in general and feel like we're kind
• 14:38
  SPEAKER_00: of getting surveilled all the time here, right?
• 14:39
  SPEAKER_00: Like we have,
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  SPEAKER_00: we carry around a little surveillance machine in our pocket all day,
• 14:43
  SPEAKER_00: or most of us do.
• 14:45
  SPEAKER_00: And To now just be unable to walk down the street or drive down around in your town
• 14:50
  SPEAKER_00: without being monitored and tracked feels pretty bad.
• 14:54
  SPEAKER_00: I broke this down again by partisanship,
• 14:57
  SPEAKER_00: and you will be unsurprised to hear that there's a strong partisan divide.
• 15:02
  SPEAKER_00: 66% of Democrats strongly oppose flock cameras versus 42% of Republicans
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_00: who strongly support them.
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_00: But again, I think we're actually seeing...
• 15:11
  SPEAKER_00: So there's much milder support on the Republican side.
• 15:13
  SPEAKER_00: Republicans are more likely to say they only somewhat support it than Democrats are
• 15:16
  SPEAKER_00: to say they only somewhat oppose it.
• 15:17
  SPEAKER_00: Only 11% of Democrats said they somewhat oppose flock cameras versus 28%
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_00: of Republicans said they somewhat support it.
• 15:21
  SPEAKER_01: And when it comes
• 15:21
  SPEAKER_00: to independents,
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_00: 45% of independents said they strongly oppose these uses of flock cameras.
• 15:45
  SPEAKER_00: So yeah, your instinct was correct.
• 15:47
  SPEAKER_00: People do not like being monitored.
• 15:48
  SPEAKER_00: And I think this also gets at something because it's not just migrants.
• 15:53
  SPEAKER_00: When you hear these stories and then you get asked about license plate trackers,
• 15:57
  SPEAKER_00: yeah, the question is about immigrants.
• 15:59
  SPEAKER_00: But you know you're getting tracked too.
• 16:01
  SPEAKER_00: And that might lead you to be a little more in opposition to that kind
• 16:05
  SPEAKER_00: of surveillance technology.
• 16:06
  SPEAKER_01: Mm-hmm.
• 16:07
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_01: On the bit about how surveillance technology intersects
• 16:11
  SPEAKER_01: with immigration enforcement,
• 16:13
  SPEAKER_01: there have been quite a number of news stories that have been talking
• 16:15
  SPEAKER_01: about ICE collecting a database of domestic terrorists and in order
• 16:22
  SPEAKER_01: to identify These domestic terrorists,
• 16:25
  SPEAKER_01: they're really looking into people that attend protests against ICE and
• 16:29
  SPEAKER_01: against immigration enforcement.
• 16:31
  SPEAKER_01: There is actually just a news story
• 16:33
  SPEAKER_01: that published this week detailing how ICE is using photojournalists
• 16:39
  SPEAKER_01: and photojournalists work to identify people that are attending these protests.
• 16:45
  SPEAKER_01: And, you know, God knows what they're going to do once they...
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_01: Identify who these people are, right?
• 16:50
  SPEAKER_01: If it has anything to do with this alleged domestic terrorist database,
• 16:53
  SPEAKER_01: we're in a lot of trouble because that doesn't only involve folks
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_01: that they're targeting for deportation,
• 16:59
  SPEAKER_01: that also involves people
• 17:00
  SPEAKER_01: that are exercising their First Amendment rights regardless
• 17:03
  SPEAKER_01: of their citizenship status.
• 17:05
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, exactly.
• 17:06
  SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
• 17:06
  SPEAKER_00: And we have seen in multiple cases,
• 17:10
  SPEAKER_00: ICE agents go after U.S. citizens, arrest and deport U.S. citizens.
• 17:14
  SPEAKER_00: I think all of us have a right to be afraid here.
• 17:16
  SPEAKER_00: And I appreciate you bringing it up, you know, but I guess just to sum this all up.
• 17:21
  SPEAKER_00: What I would say is repeat my point from the top that
• 17:23
  SPEAKER_00: while immigration is underwater,
• 17:25
  SPEAKER_00: it is the place where the administration is the least underwater.
• 17:28
  SPEAKER_00: And this more fundamental issue of anti-immigration sentiment,
• 17:32
  SPEAKER_00: both in the United States and really in almost every developed economy,
• 17:36
  SPEAKER_00: remains one of the more intractable problems facing leaders globally.
• 17:41
  SPEAKER_00: It's not just the United States.
• 17:43
  SPEAKER_00: We're talking about it here in Austria as well.
• 17:45
  SPEAKER_00: We're talking about it Interesting.
• 17:47
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you for that, Matt.
• 18:06
  SPEAKER_01: And the last question here that I have is when it comes to what people are thinking
• 18:11
  SPEAKER_01: about when they approach the polls,
• 18:13
  SPEAKER_01: where does immigration lie in terms of their list of priorities?
• 18:16
  SPEAKER_00: I found a really cool tool from YouGov where they're tracking a bunch of priorities
• 18:22
  SPEAKER_00: and how many people in their surveys say a given issue is top priority.
• 18:27
  SPEAKER_00: I would love for you to guess actually what the top priority is based
• 18:31
  SPEAKER_00: on what we've been talking about so far.
• 18:33
  SPEAKER_00: Do you have any ideas?
• 18:34
  SPEAKER_01: This is tough here because I find immigration to be intersectional
• 18:39
  SPEAKER_01: where it may not be in the top three by name,
• 18:43
  SPEAKER_01: but it is among the top three in execution, right?
• 18:47
  SPEAKER_01: So if surveillance technology is a top three concern, that also involves immigration.
• 18:53
  SPEAKER_01: If inflation is a major concern,
• 18:55
  SPEAKER_01: that also involves immigration because the more we deport people
• 18:58
  SPEAKER_01: that do skilled labor, that compounds issues inherent in the economy.
• 19:05
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
• 19:06
  SPEAKER_00: But that is such a nuanced view.
• 19:08
  SPEAKER_00: And that comes from your years of education and covering it.
• 19:11
  SPEAKER_00: And I think the average American isn't going to go for that.
• 19:14
  SPEAKER_00: So what would you guys think when the average American is asked,
• 19:16
  SPEAKER_00: what is the most important issue?
• 19:18
  SPEAKER_00: What do you think they non-intersectionally jump to right away?
• 19:22
  SPEAKER_01: I think immigration is number six at the highest.
• 19:26
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah, not even close.
• 19:28
  SPEAKER_00: Immigration prices is by far number one, with 38.1% of people saying that.
• 19:34
  SPEAKER_00: Just 5% of people said immigration was
• 19:37
  SPEAKER_01: the top priority.
• 19:37
  SPEAKER_01: Oh.
• 19:38
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 19:39
  SPEAKER_00: So it is not anywhere near the top.
• 19:42
  SPEAKER_00: And this is a tracker.
• 19:43
  SPEAKER_00: And actually, immigration has been going down.
• 19:45
  SPEAKER_00: At its peak, it was about 16%.
• 19:47
  SPEAKER_00: That was in February of 2024.
• 19:50
  SPEAKER_00: And ever since then, obviously, that was still during the Biden administration.
• 19:54
  SPEAKER_00: It has been the slow decline in salience until we're sitting now at 5.4%.
• 19:59
  SPEAKER_00: Meanwhile, inflation has gone from just about at its nadir, about 18%.
• 20:04
  SPEAKER_00: It has doubled in salience to about 32%.
• 20:06
  SPEAKER_00: Hmm.
• 20:08
  SPEAKER_01: I remember when Trump won the election against Kamala Harris and
• 20:13
  SPEAKER_01: the number one issue that people voted on was the economy.
• 20:17
  SPEAKER_01: And they thought that Trump was going to save the economy in ways
• 20:21
  SPEAKER_01: that presidential candidate Kamala Harris would not be able to do.
• 20:25
  SPEAKER_01: I would love to see a poll or research study to show if the same people that voted
• 20:29
  SPEAKER_01: for Trump are also thinking of how he has done in terms of the economy
• 20:34
  SPEAKER_01: and inflation today.
• 20:36
  SPEAKER_00: Oh, that's clearly what's killing him.
• 20:37
  SPEAKER_00: That's clearly what the data says, is he did not deliver on this promise.
• 20:42
  SPEAKER_00: And it's like James Carville said, it's the economy, stupid.
• 20:45
  SPEAKER_00: That's how Bill Clinton kept getting elected.
• 20:48
  SPEAKER_00: And Trump has not been able to deliver it and has taken so many measures,
• 20:52
  SPEAKER_00: including, as you mentioned, many of his measures on immigration.
• 20:55
  SPEAKER_00: But not just that.
• 20:56
  SPEAKER_00: Tariffs, obviously.
• 20:57
  SPEAKER_00: The war in Iran,
• 20:58
  SPEAKER_00: obviously,
• 20:59
  SPEAKER_00: that have driven up the cost of everything from energy to labor to foodstuffs
• 21:05
  SPEAKER_00: to basic consumer goods.
• 21:09
  SPEAKER_00: He has done the opposite of what he said he would do.
• 21:10
  SPEAKER_00: And he's just not getting away with it.
• 21:13
  SPEAKER_00: Ideally, he's not getting away with it.
• 21:14
  SPEAKER_00: We'll see.
• 21:15
  SPEAKER_01: Mm-hmm.
• 21:16
  SPEAKER_01: Well, lots to really look into as we approach the midterm elections in November.
• 21:21
  SPEAKER_01: Thank you so much, Matt, for sharing all of that.
• 21:24
  SPEAKER_00: Of course.
• 21:24
  SPEAKER_00: We're going to take a quick break now.
• 21:26
  SPEAKER_00: And when we come back,
• 21:27
  SPEAKER_00: we are going to look at a more qualitative aspect of this coming election,
• 21:31
  SPEAKER_00: which is the rumored plans to send ICE and FBI agents to monitor polling places.
• 21:38
  SPEAKER_00: Stick with us.
• 21:42
  SPEAKER_01: Hey, guys.
• 21:42
  SPEAKER_01: Kelly here.
• 21:43
  SPEAKER_01: We founded This Week On ICE in February of this year,
• 21:46
  SPEAKER_01: and in just a few short months,
• 21:48
  SPEAKER_01: we've been incredibly grateful for the response we've received so far.
• 21:52
  SPEAKER_01: Many of you are listening from across the U.S.
• 21:55
  SPEAKER_01: and in countries like Mexico,
• 21:56
  SPEAKER_01: Germany,
• 21:57
  SPEAKER_01: Colombia,
• 21:57
  SPEAKER_01: and the U.K.
• 21:59
  SPEAKER_01: We're so proud to inform you that our show has been awarded a seed grant by the Fund
• 22:03
  SPEAKER_01: for Investigative Journalism to help deepen our original reporting and hold power
• 22:08
  SPEAKER_01: to account as Trump's immigration crackdown continues.
• 22:11
  SPEAKER_01: But we need your help.
• 22:13
  SPEAKER_01: If this show has helped keep you informed and empowered in any way,
• 22:17
  SPEAKER_01: please consider sharing our show with a friend,
• 22:20
  SPEAKER_01: giving us a five-star rating on Apple Podcasts or Spotify,
• 22:23
  SPEAKER_01: or even pledging financial support on Substack.
• 22:26
  SPEAKER_01: It's your listenership that is the engine of our independent journalism.
• 22:34
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome back to This Week On ICE.
• 22:36
  SPEAKER_00: Kelly and I are going to talk now about the potential for ICE agents to be deployed
• 22:43
  SPEAKER_00: at polling places during the election, ICE agent or other federal agents.
• 22:47
  SPEAKER_00: So Kelly, we've been talking about this for a long time.
• 22:49
  SPEAKER_00: We've said this is a rumor.
• 22:51
  SPEAKER_00: It reminds me somewhat of what happened during the World Cup
• 22:54
  SPEAKER_00: where there was these rumors like ICE agents are going to be at the World Cup
• 22:58
  SPEAKER_00: and people got kind of scared and pissed off and that it just kind of didn't happen.
• 23:04
  SPEAKER_00: I'm wondering,
• 23:05
  SPEAKER_00: and the White House,
• 23:06
  SPEAKER_00: in all journalistic fairness, is saying that they're not going to do it.
• 23:10
  SPEAKER_00: But we know that they don't always tell the truth.
• 23:12
  SPEAKER_00: So what do you think even the rumor is having?
• 23:16
  SPEAKER_00: Can you tell me what voters or experts are thinking about how
• 23:21
  SPEAKER_00: the rumor alone is affecting the election, possibly?
• 23:24
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 23:26
  SPEAKER_01: As I've said before in other contexts on the show,
• 23:29
  SPEAKER_01: I think the Trump administration relies heavily on narrative.
• 23:33
  SPEAKER_01: They rely heavily on establishing a reality,
• 23:37
  SPEAKER_01: whether or not there is legal scaffolding to have that stand up to scrutiny.
• 23:43
  SPEAKER_01: In the context of the potential of FBI or even National Guard, ICE agents at polling, I...
• 23:52
  SPEAKER_01: I am inclined to believe that they know this will not stand up to litigation.
• 23:57
  SPEAKER_01: I don't think that they're going to deploy ICE and National Guard and FBI to polling
• 24:03
  SPEAKER_01: because they know that that is a severe infringement on First Amendment rights.
• 24:07
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 24:26
  SPEAKER_01: Administrators often plan for natural disasters or bomb threats.
• 24:30
  SPEAKER_01: Now, if you look at any state local election,
• 24:34
  SPEAKER_01: they are all talking about possible disruptions driven by the federal government.
• 24:38
  SPEAKER_01: They're taking this very seriously,
• 24:40
  SPEAKER_01: even if it means optically taking it very seriously,
• 24:42
  SPEAKER_01: knowing that they won't have to deploy or execute anything.
• 24:45
  SPEAKER_01: What I find interesting about the narrative that the Trump administration is trying
• 24:50
  SPEAKER_01: to construct is that it's twofold.
• 24:53
  SPEAKER_01: On the one hand,
• 24:54
  SPEAKER_01: the Trump administration is saying,
• 24:56
  SPEAKER_01: oh, we don't want any unauthorized voting to happen.
• 24:59
  SPEAKER_01: We don't want any non-citizen voting occurring.
• 25:02
  SPEAKER_01: And for months now, they've been trying to plant the seed of that narrative.
• 25:06
  SPEAKER_01: And as we have mentioned on this podcast before, it is statistically impossible.
• 25:11
  SPEAKER_01: Historically,
• 25:12
  SPEAKER_01: it has happened in scant amounts in the last,
• 25:14
  SPEAKER_01: you know, hundred years or so, if we look at ballot data.
• 25:18
  SPEAKER_01: There is a second wing to this,
• 25:20
  SPEAKER_01: is that the Trump administration has also built this narrative that
• 25:25
  SPEAKER_01: the voting machines could be fraudulent.
• 25:27
  SPEAKER_01: The voting machines may not be working or operating properly.
• 25:31
  SPEAKER_01: And we have seen a relative success in that bucket.
• 25:35
  SPEAKER_01: So the FBI took 2020 election ballots in Fulton County,
• 25:39
  SPEAKER_01: Georgia earlier this year, alleging but not proving voter fraud.
• 25:45
  SPEAKER_01: And so that to me is a dangerous precedent that makes this second bucket,
• 25:51
  SPEAKER_01: this idea that like the machines are corrupted in some way.
• 25:56
  SPEAKER_01: That there's another means for voter fraud to occur other
• 25:59
  SPEAKER_01: than people physically voting and punching in their vote.
• 26:03
  SPEAKER_01: This is a thing that they have been able to gain some headway in
• 26:07
  SPEAKER_01: that I find particularly worrisome.
• 26:10
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 26:11
  SPEAKER_00: And, you know,
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_00: it's not exactly unprecedented for U.S.
• 26:15
  SPEAKER_00: troops or federal agents to monitor Elections.
• 26:21
  SPEAKER_00: But the last time it happened was under very specific circumstances.
• 26:25
  SPEAKER_00: So basically,
• 26:26
  SPEAKER_00: after the Civil War,
• 26:28
  SPEAKER_00: US federal troops were sent into the South into the former Confederate States
• 26:33
  SPEAKER_00: to oversee not just the election itself,
• 26:36
  SPEAKER_00: but oversee the process of the election,
• 26:38
  SPEAKER_00: make sure that black voters were added to the voter rolls,
• 26:41
  SPEAKER_00: make sure that white militias,
• 26:42
  SPEAKER_00: KKK style groups didn't like seize ballot boxes and take them away.
• 26:47
  SPEAKER_00: And so so, you know, What I would say is a lot of Trump's actions are obviously norm-breaking.
• 26:55
  SPEAKER_00: This is norm-breaking.
• 26:56
  SPEAKER_00: It's probably illegal.
• 26:58
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not a lawyer.
• 26:59
  SPEAKER_00: But there is precedent for it under very specific circumstances.
• 27:04
  SPEAKER_00: And to your point about narrative,
• 27:05
  SPEAKER_00: like the administration working off of narrative,
• 27:10
  SPEAKER_00: oftentimes when they're caught in a controversial action,
• 27:14
  SPEAKER_00: they say, well, this happened before.
• 27:15
  SPEAKER_00: This happened before, so it's fine.
• 27:17
  SPEAKER_00: And they just completely misconstrue What
• 27:20
  SPEAKER_00: the precedent they're citing is deliberately to advance their narrative.
• 27:25
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm worried about that as well.
• 27:26
  SPEAKER_00: I think that if we do see disruptions to the elections that are surrounded
• 27:33
  SPEAKER_00: by federal agents, or even to your point about the security.
• 27:37
  SPEAKER_00: We will hear this assault on history,
• 27:43
  SPEAKER_00: basically,
• 27:44
  SPEAKER_00: this complete misrepresentation of why federal troops were in the South,
• 27:50
  SPEAKER_00: which was to protect Black voters during the Radical Reconstruction,
• 27:55
  SPEAKER_00: the very early period of Reconstruction in which more radical policy was pursued.
• 28:00
  SPEAKER_00: And they're going to, again, mutilate Black history.
• 28:04
  SPEAKER_00: To advance their own aims, which they do all the time.
• 28:06
  SPEAKER_01: Yes.
• 28:07
  SPEAKER_01: On this bit about how people are going to go to the polls and if there's
• 28:12
  SPEAKER_01: a chilling effect, it's very, very hard to statistically capture a chilling effect.
• 28:18
  SPEAKER_01: You can't really prove what's not there.
• 28:20
  SPEAKER_01: But there are some indications about how,
• 28:23
  SPEAKER_01: you know,
• 28:24
  SPEAKER_01: I think I'm willing to believe that a chilling effect has already taken control,
• 28:29
  SPEAKER_01: right?
• 28:29
  SPEAKER_01: But at the same time,
• 28:31
  SPEAKER_01: Trump has really been stymied on some major fights,
• 28:37
  SPEAKER_01: some major battles on the election process.
• 28:40
  SPEAKER_01: So for one, Congress didn't pass the Save America Act.
• 28:44
  SPEAKER_01: That would have required voters to prove their citizenship.
• 28:47
  SPEAKER_01: And I think that is a pretty significant loss on the administration's part.
• 28:52
  SPEAKER_01: The second thing is that the US Supreme Court blocked the US Postal Service
• 28:56
  SPEAKER_01: from imposing new rules on mail ballots.
• 28:59
  SPEAKER_01: So mail-in ballots is still a possibility.
• 29:02
  SPEAKER_01: You can still do it the same way as before.
• 29:04
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 29:06
  SPEAKER_01: The other thing is that the Justice Department has lost over
• 29:10
  SPEAKER_01: a dozen lawsuits seeking to force states to turn over sensitive voter data,
• 29:14
  SPEAKER_01: with the exception of the Fulton County,
• 29:17
  SPEAKER_01: Georgia election ballots taken by the FBI earlier this year,
• 29:21
  SPEAKER_01: the one that I mentioned I was very worried about.
• 29:24
  SPEAKER_01: And a lot of these notions that I've mentioned right now is all from this piece
• 29:29
  SPEAKER_01: by Jonathan Shorman in News from the States,
• 29:32
  SPEAKER_01: which we're going to link in our newsletter.
• 29:34
  SPEAKER_01: So the Trump administration...
• 29:36
  SPEAKER_01: I think is aware of this cascade of failures, this cascade of lost battles.
• 29:42
  SPEAKER_01: And I'm willing to believe that the chilling effect won't stand up to the many,
• 29:47
  SPEAKER_01: many issues that people have expressed major disapproval of that you have mentioned
• 29:52
  SPEAKER_01: at the top of the show.
• 29:53
  SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
• 29:54
  SPEAKER_00: The fact is people are pissed, you know, and you're absolutely right about that.
• 29:58
  SPEAKER_00: And I think the best way to get an American to do something is
• 30:00
  SPEAKER_00: to make them really angry about it.
• 30:02
  SPEAKER_00: So I'm 100% with you.
• 30:04
  SPEAKER_00: What do you say we leave it there for this week, Kelly?
• 30:06
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, that sounds good to me.
• 30:08
  SPEAKER_00: Sounds good.
• 30:08
  SPEAKER_00: Thank you so much for tuning in, folks.
• 30:10
  SPEAKER_00: Please do yourself a favor and check your voter registration status.
• 30:14
  SPEAKER_00: You can go to usa.gov,
• 30:15
  SPEAKER_00: you enter some basic information,
• 30:18
  SPEAKER_00: and it will help you make sure that your registration is up to date,
• 30:21
  SPEAKER_00: they have your right address,
• 30:22
  SPEAKER_00: they have your right And that will make sure your vote can be heard this cycle.
• 30:27
  SPEAKER_00: There's still time in most US states and territories to register to vote.
• 30:31
  SPEAKER_00: Just please, please, please make it a top priority to make sure your registration is intact.
• 30:36
  SPEAKER_00: And if it's not intact, address that.
• 30:38
  SPEAKER_00: So many of our guests have told us the number one thing you can do to support
• 30:42
  SPEAKER_00: the people caught in detention,
• 30:44
  SPEAKER_00: to support the people who have been sent overseas,
• 30:46
  SPEAKER_00: to support the people who have been abused by this government that...
• 30:50
  SPEAKER_00: Nominally at least is supposed to care about human rights, is to vote.
• 30:53
  SPEAKER_00: So please, please, please,
• 30:55
  SPEAKER_00: if you do one thing for us ever in this podcast history,
• 30:59
  SPEAKER_00: register to vote and make sure your voice will be heard.
• 31:01
  SPEAKER_00: In the meantime, stay safe, look out for your neighbors, and we'll see you next week.
• 31:06
  [music]