Findings are from a DDIA poll of 3,000 Latinos conducted in September 2024, the full findings of which were released in February 2025.
TAKEAWAYS: Latinos & Immigration
The Digital Democracy Institute of the Americas (DDIA) partnered with YouGov to conduct a nationally representative poll of 3,000 U.S. Latino adults, from September 6 to September 30, 2024, in English and Spanish.
The poll explored the five key topics below. This document outlines takeaways from the highlighted areas:
Familiarity and belief in a series of misinformation narratives and claims, including over time.
Changes in levels of trust in elections, and efficacy and vote intention since the primaries.
Agreement with new election-specific claims about Kamala Harris and Donald Trump.
Sentiments around immigration-related topics.
Updated views on generative-AI technologies and regulation.
How do Latinos in the United States feel about immigration-related statements made and discussed during the 2024 election cycle?
Our findings indicate strong positive attitudes among U.S. Latinos toward immigrants in general, with high levels of agreement among Latinos we polled that “immigrants positively contribute to American communities” and that “immigrants improve America by bringing new ideas and cultures.”
BUT, when it comes to unauthorized immigration, beliefs become more complex.
Nearly half of Latino survey respondents agree that “increased illegal immigration brings increased crime” (47% agree) and that “immigrants can be a drain on local resources” (44% agree).
That said, Latinos mostly reject the statement that “immigrants take jobs away from people who were born in the United States” (52% disagree).
The statements break down as follows:
“Immigrants take jobs away from people born in the U.S.”: 52.1% disagree, 29.1% agree.
“Immigrants can be a drain on local resources”: 35.8% disagree, 43.7% agree.
“Increased illegal immigration brings increased crime”: 34% disagree, 47.1% agree.
“Immigrants improve America by bringing new ideas and cultures”: 16.3% disagree, 63.5% agree.
“Immigrants positively contribute to American communities”: 15.4% disagree, 63.9% agree.
Across the first poll we conducted in March/April and this poll conducted in September 2024, we found that similar numbers of Latinos accepted claims that Democrats were failing to secure the border for electoral gain and narratives that Democrats were engaging in electoral fraud.
Just slightly over 40% of those who had seen “Democrats are failing to secure the U.S. southern border in order to allow undocumented immigrants to vote for them in U.S. elections” accepted the claim in both of our surveys.
These estimates stayed pretty similar across waves (41% in our March/April poll; 40% in our September poll).