As President Obama weighs moving unilaterally to grant legal status to potentially millions of illegal immigrants, 46 percent of Americans say he should wait for action from a new GOP-led Congress and 42 percent say he should act now.
Those numbers come from a telephone poll of 1,000 adults taken from Thursday to Sunday for USA Today.
The issue, not surprisingly, largely breaks down along partisan lines: six in 10 Democrats want Mr. Obama to act now, while more than three-quarters of Republicans want him to wait until January for a new GOP-led Congress to pass legislation to address the issue.
Forty-four percent of independents want him to act now, while 46 percent want him to wait.
USA Today also notes that groups that have traditionally been most supportive of Mr. Obama aren’t necessarily enthusiastic about the possibility of his acting now on the issue: 39 percent of women and 50 percent of people under the age of 30 favor such action.
Senate Democrats, led by Majority Leader Harry Reid, sent Mr. Obama a letter Monday offering their support for his expected claim of legal authority on an issue that has quickly come to dominate the current lame-duck session of Congress.
Republicans in Congress have warned against Mr. Obama’s acting alone and are debating possible responses, such as attaching language to a must-pass spending bill that could limit the government from carrying out any theoretical executive actions.
But such a move would also revive talk of another possible government shutdown, which Republican leaders say isn’t going to happen.
The margin of error for the poll is plus or minus four percentage points.
• David Sherfinski can be reached at dsherfinski@washingtontimes.com.
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