Pro-reform Republicans are frantically trying to massage the language around immigration legislation, especially the phrase “pathway to citizenship,” which Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) disdains even as he endorses an eventual path to citizenship for illegal immigrants. But according to a GOP pollster, the citizenship fight is largely a figment of the Beltway’s imagination, generating little concern among Republican voters in focus groups.
“When you bring up the phrase ‘pathway to citizenship,’ they don’t know what it means,” John McLaughlin, a pollster for GOP firm Resurgent Republic, told reporters Thursday, according to the Huffington Post. “There’s no reaction.”
Their findings are in line with a recent poll by the Brookings Institute and Public Religion Research Institute, which found majority support for immigration reform with citizenship among Republicans, white evangelicals, and white working class voters.
