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Poll: 38% want to keep current immigration level

By Andrew V. Pestano
Immigration activists protest the Trump Administration's illegal immigrant deportation plan at the White House in Washington on June 1. A Gallup poll found that in 2017, 38 percent of Americans would like immigration to the United States be kept at the present level, 35 percent think immigration should decrease and 24 percent think immigration should increase. Photo by Kevin Dietsch/UPI
Immigration activists protest the Trump Administration's illegal immigrant deportation plan at the White House in Washington on June 1. A Gallup poll found that in 2017, 38 percent of Americans would like immigration to the United States be kept at the present level, 35 percent think immigration should decrease and 24 percent think immigration should increase. Photo by Kevin Dietsch/UPI | License Photo

June 28 (UPI) -- A new Gallup poll shows 38 percent of Americans would like to see immigration to the United States kept at the present level, while 35 percent think immigration should decrease.

The poll released Tuesday, which has a 4 percent margin of error, also found 24 percent of Americans said immigration should increase. In Gallup's 2016 poll, 38 percent of Americans said they think immigration should decrease, 38 percent said they think immigration should stay at the present level and 21 percent said it should increase.

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"As a whole, Americans' attitudes about immigration haven't changed significantly since Donald Trump's presidential campaign platform promised action against illegal immigrants," Gallup wrote in a statement.

About 60 percent of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents last year said they wanted a decrease in immigration. In 2017, 48 percent said they want a decrease.

In 2017, about 23 percent of Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents said immigration should decrease, an increase of 3 percent from last year.

"Since his election in November, Trump has reaffirmed his pledge to build a wall on the U.S.-Mexico border. He also had recent success with immigration policy when the Supreme Court decided to allow some aspects of his program for banning travelers into the U.S. from six Muslim-majority countries," Gallup added. "But Trump's well-known stances on these issues, which propelled him as a presidential candidate, have not had any meaningful effect on Americans' preferences for U.S. immigration policy."

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Gallup said that general desire by Americans to decrease immigration is near a historic low in more than half a century.

The poll was based on telephone interviews conducted June 7-11 with a random sample of 1,009 U.S. adults, has a 4 percent margin of error.

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