Polling on immigration still a big problem for Democrats.

They believe that they are winning the argument for some reason, but recent polling should make them take pause.

What about domestic policy? Despite riots at ICE raids and hair-pulling by the Protection Racket Media, deporting criminal illegal aliens is still an 80/20 issue with the electorate -- 79/21, to be precise. Closing the border follows closely behind at 70/30. Sixty-five percent oppose "sanctuary city" policies, and 70% want states and localities to cooperate with ICE and other immigration enforcement efforts. (link)

While Democrats (like Newsome) are encouraging people to stand up and fight against law enforcement, the bulk of the country believes sanctuary cities and states are a bad idea and believes very strongly that Newsom and gang should be cooperating (not fighting) with ICE. While this may help Newsom in a Democratic primary, it cannot help him in any general election. He's going to get hammered on this issue if he is still pushing it in 2028.

I am aware that the overall anti-immigration hysteria is cooling and that people are going to settle back into the age old debates on more or less immigration, with the focus moving back to legal (not illegal) forms of immigration. Gallup saw a huge drop in people frustrated over too much illegal immigration and more people now comfortable with current levels (or even wanting more). But this is going to be largely due to the reality that we have effectively closed down the border.

Over the past two months we have only allowed like 13-14 thousand aliens to cross the border and not one of them was "released" into the United States. This is a far cry from the several thousand daily crossings where border control did little to stop them and did almost nothing to detain anyone they did stop. For 12 of the past 16 years, catch and release was the policy in place. Now it is no longer the policy and therefor less people will be upset about too much immigration. That sort of polling shift is a testament to the success Trump has had at the border and with immigration policy in general. It doesn't mean what he is doing is unpopular.

Democrats seem to miss the boat on many of these wedge issue. Instead of listening, they keep trying to change people's beliefs. This hasn't worked since the drop in MSM influence and it probably will not work moving forward.