The partisan split on immigration has never been wider

Immigration laws protest.
(Image credit: John Moore/Getty Images)

President Trump's negative immigration rhetoric doesn't appear to be very persuasive.

Back in 1994, 63 percent of Americans seemingly agreed with Trump's current anti-migrant message, saying immigrants burdened the country. But today, the reverse is true: 62 percent of Americans now say "immigrants strengthen our country because of their hard work and talents," a Pew Research Center poll published Thursday shows.

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE
https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/flexiimages/jacafc5zvs1692883516.jpg

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

Views on immigrants are easily defined by generation as well, the Pew survey shows. Just 44 percent of the Silent generation, born between 1928-1945, said immigrants strengthen our country, while 75 percent of millennials agreed. The perception of immigrants has generally improved since 1994 — a year when some millennials weren't even born — but has remained more stagnant among older generations.

Pew surveyed 1,505 people via landline and cell phone from Jan. 9-14 with a margin of error of 3 percentage points. See more poll results here.

Explore More

Kathryn is a graduate of Syracuse University, with degrees in magazine journalism and information technology, along with hours to earn another degree after working at SU's independent paper The Daily Orange. She's currently recovering from a horse addiction while living in New York City, and likes to share her extremely dry sense of humor on Twitter.