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Comment by rayiner | Hacker News Reader

The ICE theatrics under Noem was unpopular. The underlying policy of mass deportations has been consistently popular: https://harvardharrispoll.com/assets/uploads/2026/07/HHP_Jul... (p. 22).

"Deporting all immigrants who are here illegally" was polling at 55% approve/45% disapprove as recently as July.

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The issue is that people's idea of illegal immigrants are hardened criminals living a lift of crime, whereas in reality the majority of people that are being deported are normal people that overstayed their visa, ie. the low hanging fruit. So people can be both supportive of the policy but dismayed at the implementation, which is what we are broadly seeing here.

The Harvard-Harris survey linked above asks separately about “deporting immigrants who are here illegally and have committed crimes.” Support for that was at 78% in July.

There was opposition to Noem’s theatrics. But it seems like Mullen’s quieter approach has taken the heat off and most of the focus now is on the shit inflation and Iran war.

"The ICE stuff" means what ICE is actually doing, not some abstract, lawful policy that you could imagine instead. This is precisely the point. Many people who voted for Trump did not understand what they were going to get.

Actual support for Trump's immigration policy and ICE is much lower than you suggest.

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/fox-news-poll-majority-says...

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