Harsh Deportation Tools Are Just Fine With Many Americans

At The Washington Post, Aaron Blake considers how the Biden campaign’s plan to win voters by characterizing former President Donald Trump’s proposed mass deportation plan as un-American could backfire at a time when Americans are increasingly supportive, on the surface, of harsh immigration measures. However, according to Blake, more Americans support a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants than mass deportations. PRRI’s 2023 American Values Survey finds that 60% of Americans say that undocumented immigrants living in the United States should be given a way to become citizens, provided they meet certain requirements, compared with 25% who say that all undocumented immigrants living in the country should be identified and deported.

Biden Administration Plans to Reclassify Marijuana, Easing Restrictions Nationwide

Julie Tsirkin and Monica Alba at NBC report that the Biden administration is taking historic steps to ease federal restrictions on cannabis by reclassifying the drug from the strictest Schedule I to Schedule III. While any reclassification is still months from going into effect, this shift would allow research into potential medical benefits and eliminate tax burdens for businesses in states where marijuana is legal. Congress is also currently considering the HOPE Act, a bipartisan bill that would assist with the expungement of criminal records for non-violent cannabis offenses. PRRI finds that more than half of Americans (52%) have at least some trust in the criminal justice system, but that percentage falls to around four in ten for Gen Z adults (42%) and millennials (43%).

Understanding America’s Overlooked Religious Middle

In his latest #WhiteTooLong Substack column, PRRI President and Founder Robert P. Jones, Ph.D., examines America’s “religious middle” of those who resist left-right political stereotypes. This group, which includes white mainline/non-evangelical Protestants, white Catholics, and Hispanic Protestants, leans Republican, but not overwhelmingly, and holds significantly different views than white evangelical Protestants on a number of issues. Jones writes that the religious middle is likely to play an important role in determining the outcome of the 2024 presidential contest; in five of the seven battleground states, white mainline Protestants alone outnumber white evangelical Protestants.

United Methodists Begin To Reverse Longstanding Anti-LGBTQ Policies

For the Associated Press, Peter Smith reports that delegates to the United Methodist Church’s General Conference have begun voting to reverse some of the denomination’s anti-LGBTQ policies. This vote comes in the wake of the denomination’s historic schism when more than 7,600 congregations left over their disagreement on same-sex marriage and LGBTQ ordination. Still to come this week are final votes on whether to remove the denomination’s bans on LGBTQ clergy and same-sex marriage. PRRI’s survey of mainline Protestant clergy finds that 79% of all mainline clergy, including 72% of United Methodist clergy, support allowing same-sex couples to legally marry.