Politics
Poll: Immigration debate deeply divides California Democrats
Immigration and border security issues unify Republican voters while dividing Democratic voters in California, a statewide poll has found.
The findings of the new UC Berkeley Institute of Governmental Studies poll, co-sponsored by the Los Angeles Times, illustrate some of the political difficulties President Biden faces in dealing with the large number of unauthorized migrants crossing the U.S. southern border.
Even in California, a Democratic stronghold, registered voters by 62% to 30% say U.S. borders are not secure in preventing people from entering the country illegally, the poll found. The majority who say the border is not secure is even larger among likely voters.
Voters who support former President Trump, are conservative or identify as Republicans are nearly unanimous in saying the border is not secure. Among strongly conservative voters, 88% say the border is not secure, versus 8% who say it is.
Democrats, liberals and voters who support Biden are more evenly divided. Among California voters who identify as strongly liberal, 54% say the border is secure; 30% say it is not.
Democrats also split on the question of whether unauthorized immigrants create a burden for the country. Overall, 42% of registered voters say migrants are a “major burden,” 30% say they are a “minor burden,” and 22% say they are not a burden, the poll found.
“The findings show that immigration is not clear-cut even in California, whose reputation as a sanctuary state often colors discussion on the issue,” said G. Cristina Mora, co-director of the Institute of Governmental Studies.
The divide among Democrats could signal trouble for Biden on the 2024 campaign trail, although more so in other states than in California, said Mark DiCamillo, director of the poll. “The odds of a [Republican] carrying the state are very long,” he said.
In California, the effect is more likely to play out in competitive congressional elections, which could help determine the House majority. Those include the race to fill the seat of Rep. Katie Porter (D-Irvine), who is running for U.S. Senate, as well as competitive districts in northern Los Angeles County and the Central Valley. Republican candidates in those districts could center immigration issues as part of their platforms, DiCamillo said.
“This issue is one that could play to the Republicans’ favor,” he noted.
As the number of unauthorized immigrants crossing the border has increased, Biden has come under fire from Republicans, who cast his border policies as weak, but also from some fellow Democrats.
Democratic mayors of New York and Chicago, among other large cities, have said services are buckling under a steady swell of migrants and have criticized the federal government for its handling of the issue.
In Congress, Republicans have been insisting that Biden agree to major changes in immigration policy, especially regarding the legal right of migrants to claim asylum in the U.S. In the Senate, Republicans have insisted on a border agreement as their price for voting in favor of sending additional aid to Ukraine, a high priority for Biden.
Unauthorized migration across the U.S. southern border hit record levels in fiscal 2023, which ended in September, topping 2 million for the second year in a row.
Many of the migrants who arrive at the southern border seek asylum, claiming persecution in their home countries. But the issue does not end at the border: The thousands of daily arrivals have overwhelmed an aging immigration system and created a backlog of asylum cases. Asylum seekers who are released into the U.S. and are given a court date are waiting years, if not a decade, to appear before a judge.
Biden has indicated a willingness to accept at least some of the Republican demands, which has angered some Democrats and immigration advocates.
Reaching an agreement remains an uphill battle, however, and the poll demonstrates how the issue consolidates the Republican voting bloc while dividing Democrats.
Voters are split over their view of the nation’s asylum laws, the poll found. Republican voters, conservatives and voters who support Trump agree that the laws are too lenient.
Democrats, meanwhile, are split: 17% say the law is too lenient, 29% say it’s about right, and 33% say it’s too restrictive. However, among those who identify as strongly liberal, a majority, 56%, say the law is too restrictive, and 6% call it too lenient, while 24% say it is about right.
Views of the asylum laws do not vary much across lines of race or ethnicity, the poll found.
The poll also found widespread skepticism that new laws would be effective in reducing the number of migrants arriving at the border: 45% of voters think new laws would be effective; 42% say they would not. Liberal voters are much more likely than conservatives to say that new laws would not be effective.
Immigrants are more likely than native-born voters to say that new laws would have an impact: 53% of California voters who were born in another country say they would be effective, while 32% say they would not. Native-born voters are evenly divided on that question.
The Berkeley IGS poll was conducted online Jan. 4-8 among a random sample of 8,199 registered California voters, including a weighted sub-sample of 4,470 voters likely to take part in the March 5 primary.
The results were weighted to match census and voter registration benchmarks, so estimates of the margin of error may be imprecise. The results have an estimated margin of error of 1.5 percentage points in either direction for the full sample.
Politics
Warren tells Trump to ‘sign the damn bill’ as bipartisan housing package remains stalled in Washington
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Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., lashed out at President Donald Trump during a recent local television interview, labeling him a “man-child” throwing a “tantrum” over his refusal to sign a sweeping bipartisan housing package.
Appearing on WCVB’s “On the Record,” the left-wing senator did not hold back her frustration over the stalled legislation, delivering a blunt message to the president: “Sign the damn bill.”
“If he cared about the American people, he’d have already signed the damn thing,” Warren said during the interview, arguing that Trump “does not care about the economic survival of America’s working families.”
FILE – The Senate previously advanced the massive housing package geared toward lowering the costs of homes and supercharging the housing supply. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., pitched it as legislation to prevent America from becoming a “nation of renters.” (Jemal Countess/Getty Images for Protect Borrowers ; Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)
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The 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act is an expansive bipartisan package that she said contains nearly 50 provisions designed to address the nationwide housing emergency.
Warren noted that decades of under-building have driven prices up, leaving the U.S. in need of millions of new units.
The primary focus of the bill is to lower the costs of construction and make it easier to build new homes.
FILE – President Donald Trump previously said lawmakers must first approve the SAVE America Act before he moves forward with the housing package. (Yuri Gripas/Abaca/Bloomberg)
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The bill, which was co-sponsored by Sen. Tim Scott, R-S.C., also includes a secondary focus aimed at blocking corporate consolidation of the housing market.
Warren explained that the legislation is designed to keep private equity firms from buying up local neighborhoods and turning America “into a nation of renters.”
According to Warren, the legislation had widespread support from both sides of the aisle before it was stalled.
TRUMP VOWS BLOCK ON SIGNING NEW LAWS UNTIL SAVE AMERICA ACT PASSES SENATE
She claimed the bill was “handed to the president on a silver platter” and that lawmakers from both parties were eagerly taking credit for the legislation.
“Republicans were all going online, saying, ‘well, I helped write that bill. This bill is terrific,’” Warren said. “So everybody’s out there saying, ‘my bill, I helped make this happen,’ right up until the man-child has a tantrum and announces he will not be signing it.”
FILE – Sen. Elizabeth Warren called President Donald Trump a “man-child” during the interview, describing his refusal to sign the bill as a “tantrum.” (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
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Critics of the legislation claim it does not allocate fresh federal funding, directly address rising costs of homeownership, or go far enough to address permitting issues.
The president previously canceled a scheduled signing event, insisting lawmakers must first approve the unrelated SAVE America Act, a voting-focused measure, before he moves forward.
The White House did not immediately respond to Fox News Digital’s request for comment.
Fox News Digital’s Alex Miller contributed to this report.
Veteran MS NOW anchor Alex Witt is leaving the news network, which is moving away from live evening programming on weekends.
The new weekend programming strategy announced Friday is a cost-saving measure that will give parent company Versant more resources for a new direct-to-consumer streaming offering that makes MS NOW available to consumers without a pay-TV subscription. The company is also looking to expand its live event business.
According to a memo from MS NOW President Rebecca Kutler, “The Weekend: Primetime,” a live discussion program launched last year, will have its final airing Saturday.
One of the program’s co-hosts, Antonia Hylton, will take over Witt’s midday shifts later this year. Hylton’s co-hosts Ayman Mohyeldin, Catherine Rampell and Elise Jordan will remain with MS NOW and continue to appear on other programs.
Kutler said job losses from the moves are minimal and encouraged staffers who lose their current roles to apply for 40 current job openings at the company with more on the way. MS NOW has been staffing up its news operation since separating from NBC News last year.
MS NOW changed its name from MSNBC in November. The network, along with other Comcast-owned cable channels, were spun off into Versant in January.
Weekends have long been a ratings weak spot for MS NOW, which while a distant second to Fox News, has seen audience growth in 2026 and remains ahead of CNN. The network has started to rely on podcasts such as “Pod Save America,” from Crooked Media, to fill some hours. The episodes have performed strongly enough for MS NOW to try similar deals with outside podcast producers.
“Throughout the summer, we will expand our taped strategy and announce new content partnerships,” Kutler said in her memo.
With the changes, MS NOW will still have 20 hours of live programming each weekend and will be staffed to handle breaking news.
Witt joined the network formerly known as MSNBC in 1999, long before it began its strong tilt toward progressive political commentary. Over the years, Witt’s weekend newscast became one of the few programs on the network that delivered straight news without opinion.
Kutler called Witt “a beloved longtime member of our MS NOW family” and “a continued, trusted, and steady presence for our audiences.”
While Witt works through the summer, Hylton will anchor the 11 a.m. weekday time period, which will eventually be handled by former NBC News White House correspondent Peter Alexander.
Politics
McCarthy says Trump will use ‘everything he can’ to force Senate action on SAVE America Act
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As infighting over the SAVE America Act throws congressional Republicans into disarray, President Donald Trump’s bid to get the stalled election bill across the finish line gained one notable ally.
Former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., told Fox News Digital that he supports the election integrity measure and indicated that Trump should continue to use every available tool to pressure the Senate to pass it.
“He’s going to try everything he can to make sure he passes that through,” McCarthy said in a brief interview outside the U.S. Capitol.
The ex-speaker’s comments came after Trump abruptly called off a signing ceremony Wednesday for a bipartisan housing bill to pressure the Republican-controlled Senate to act on the SAVE America Act.
President Donald Trump boards Air Force One as he departs Reading Regional Airport in Reading, Pa., on June 23, 2026. (Evelyn Hockstein/Reuters)
IRATE REPUBLICANS ACCUSE TRUMP OF HANDING DEMOCRATS A WIN AFTER BLOWING UP HOUSING PACKAGE
The move surprised Republican lawmakers, some of whom were praising the bill’s passage at a press conference when Trump’s Truth Social post broke.
But Trump has repeatedly cast the election measure — requiring proof of citizenship to vote in federal elections and voter identification requirements — as his top legislative priority.
The legislation’s momentum, however, has slowed in the upper chamber, where Republican leadership insists the votes aren’t there amid widespread Democratic opposition. Senate Republicans have also been unwilling to eliminate the legislative filibuster, which requires a 60-vote threshold to pass the legislation.
Former Speaker of the House Kevin McCarthy speaks during a ceremony honoring President Ronald Reagan on the 115th anniversary of his birthday at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library in Simi Valley, Calif., on Feb. 6, 2026. (Hans Gutknecht/MediaNews Group)
TRUMP CALLS MAIL IN VOTING CORRUPT AS SENATE BEGINS DEBATE ON SAVE ACT REQUIRING VOTER ID
Amid the SAVE standoff, a group of conservative lawmakers effectively shut down the House floor in an effort to force Senate action on the election bill.
But the Senate recessed Wednesday for two weeks over the July 4 holiday, leaving the measure in limbo until lawmakers return.
The conservative-led blockade sparked fierce backlash, with several members inside the GOP conference telling Fox News Digital the move risked torpedoing their own legislative agenda.
Meanwhile, the House has also yet to pass a version of the legislation incorporating several of the president’s priorities, including a mail-in voting crackdown and provisions banning men from competing in women’s sports and child sex change procedures.
Trump has not indicated whether he will sign the 21st Century ROAD to Housing Act, despite the likely existence of a veto-proof majority.
House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., told reporters Thursday that the housing bill had been transmitted to the White House for Trump’s signature following a meeting with the president.
Speaker of the House Mike Johnson, R-La., talks with reporters in the U.S. Capitol on June 10, 2026. (Tom Williams/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Images)
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Trump now has 10 days to sign the package or veto it. If he does nothing, the legislation automatically becomes law at the end of the 10-day period.
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