Overwhelming majority of Americans say border is in crisis or a ‘major problem’: poll

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Fox News White House correspondent Jacqui Heinrich has the latest on plans to combat the border crisis on Special Report.

An overwhelming majority of Americans say that the southern border is either in a state of crisis or a "major problem" according to a new poll released this week.

According to the new Gallup poll, 39% of Americans believe the border situation is a crisis, 33% believe it is a "major problem" while only 22% believe it is a "minor problem" and just 5% believe it isn’t a problem.

That means that 72% believe that the border is either a crisis or a major problem. That is a tick lower than in 2019, when 74% said the same thing. 

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A U.S. Border Patrol agent speaks to immigrants blocked from entering a high-traffic illegal border crossing area along Rio Grande in El Paso, Texas on December 20, 2022 as viewed from Ciudad Juarez, Mexico. (John Moore/Getty Images)

The most notable change has been among Democrats. In 2019, 68% of Democrats said it was a crisis or major problem, that has now dropped to 56% with just 17% saying it is a crisis.

Among Republicans, 88% said it was a crisis or major problem in 2019, now it is 91%. Independents have gone from 70% rating it as such in 2019 to 71%.

The border has been facing a massive and historic migrant crisis since early 2021, two years after the Trump administration faced a crisis in 2019. However, the numbers since 2021 have eclipsed those seen in 2019. There were over 1.7 million migrant encounters in FY 2021 and more than 2.4 million in FY 2022.

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Republicans have blamed the Biden administration for implementing policies they say have spurred migrants to make the journey north to be released into the U.S. Specifically, they highlight reduced interior enforcement, the expansion of "catch-and-release" and the ending of Trump-era policies like border wall construction and the Remain-in-Mexico policy.

The Biden administration has argued that it is working to fix an asylum system destroyed by the prior administration, while dealing with a hemisphere-wide crisis.

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It has focused on expanding legal asylum pathways -- including a controversial expansion of the use of humanitarian parole to wave migrants through into the U.S. It has combined that with an asylum rule which limits migrants from claiming asylum if they have entered illegally and failed to claim asylum in a country through which they already passed. That rule is now facing multiple legal challenges.

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Customs and Border Protection announced this week that there were over 144,000 migrant encounters at the southern border in June. It marks the lowest number since February 2021, although it is still significantly high compared to pre-2021 crisis numbers. The administration has tied the drop in numbers to its policies, but called on Republicans to pass immigration reform and provide additional funding.

Meanwhile, Republicans are investigating the conduct of DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas. House Republicans released a report late Wednesday accusing Mayorkas of an "intentional" dereliction of duty in his handling of the migrant surge.