The great majority of Americans do not regard the Boston bombing as an issue related to immigration, despite the best efforts of a small number of Republican politicians, according to a new poll that was released yesterday. The poll also suggests that the US public has, however, been fairly inattentive when it comes to following the progress of the debates surrounding comprehensive immigration reform.
Although debates over the new immigration legislation are still at a very early stage, there was an attempt to exploit last month’s bombings for political capital by a few Republicans due to the fact that the bombers turned out to be immigrants. The Pew Research Center survey, however, shows that just 36% of respondents thought that the attack was in any way important to the issue of immigration reform, with 58% considering it to be a different issue entirely.
Fifty-seven percent of the survey respondents also did not believe that immigration reform, one way or the other, would have an impact on any future such incidents. Only 19% said that they were actively following the political discussions on immigration reform, with many being ignorant of some of the key aspects of the new legislation.
The Senate immigration proposal appears to have divided respondents, with 28% against the proposal and 33% in favor of it. The new bipartisan bill hopes to help provide workers, bolster border security and allow immigrants to earn a path to US citizenship.