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More Americans disapprove of the destructive anti-ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) riots and protests that erupted in Los Angeles June 6 than approve of them, recent polls have discovered.
RealClearPolling reported that a June 9 YouGov poll found that only 36% of Americans approve of the protests compared with 45% who disapprove and 19% who were unsure of their stance.
Another poll from InsiderAdvantage, conducted June 9-10, found that most Americans agree with Trump’s decision to deploy the National Guard in Los Angeles, a move that was met with strong objection from California lawmakers.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom, a Democrat, criticized the deployments on X.
“U.S. Marines have served honorably across multiple wars in defense of democracy. They are heroes,” he wrote. “They shouldn’t be deployed on American soil facing their own countrymen to fulfill the deranged fantasy of a dictatorial President. This is un-American.”
Similarly, Democratic Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass and Democratic Rep. Maxine Waters have opposed the National Guard’s presence in Los Angeles.
However, the InsiderAdvantage poll found that 59% of Americans said they agreed with the National Guard’s deployment, while 89% of Republicans, 56% of independents, and 37% of Democrats said the same thing.
According to RealClearPolling, a poll conducted in key congressional districts by Trump pollster Tony Fabrizio found that Americans also generally agree with the decisions to hire 40,000 more ICE agents and increase law enforcement’s funding to fight drug cartels.
While Republicans are highlighting the protests as “a violent mob waving another country’s flag,” as political strategist Jesse Hunt called it, according to RealClearPolitics, Democrats are trying to frame the riots in a different light.
RealClearPolling reported that a Democrat-leaning Way to Win and Impact Research poll asked respondents about their approval of Trump’s approach to immigration, gave examples of arrests and deportations, and then asked about their approval a second time. The poll found that approval dropped from 50% to 45% after hearing examples of deportations.
RealClearPolling noted that framing the issue with specific examples could help drag down Republicans’ current 23-point lead on approval of Trump’s handling of immigration, where 43% of Republicans approve, compared with only 19% of Democrats.
