Should government try to bring back people mistakenly deported? What poll found

Brendan Rascius, Miami Herald on Apr 9, 2025

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Most Americans believe that the government has made mistakes when deporting illegal immigrants — and that it should work to correct them, according to new polling.

The poll comes after President Donald Trump’s administration admitted to accidentally sending a legal resident to a foreign prison.

In the latest YouGov poll, 52% of respondents said that, in the past few months, the government has deported one or more people who are legally allowed to live in the U.S. Meanwhile, 24% said this has not happened.

There was a large partisan divide on this question, with the majority of Democrats and independents — 77% and 53%, respectively — saying legal residents had been deported. Just 24% of Republicans said the same.

More than half, 52%, of Americans think the U.S. has wrongfully deported someone in the past few months; furthermore, 64% think it is possible for the U.S. to bring back someone they mistakenly deported, and 77% say they should attempt to do so

The poll — conducted April 8 with 3,872 U.S. adults — also asked respondents if it is possible for the government to bring back people to the U.S. who were accidentally deported.

Nearly two-thirds, 64%, said this is possible, while 10% said it is not.

On this question, there was agreement across the political spectrum, with 71% of Democrats, 62% of independents and 59% of Republicans saying the government has the power to bring deportees back.

The results were similar when respondents were asked if the government should work to bring mistakenly deported individuals back to U.S. soil.

The vast majority, 77%, said the government should try to return these people to the U.S., while 8% said it should not. Support for returning them was strong across the board, with 87% of Democrats, 76% of independents and 66% of Republicans in favor.

The poll — which has a margin of error of 2 percentage points — was fielded after a legal U.S. resident got swept up in Trump’s effort to deport migrants illegally in the countryto a prison in El Salvador using an 18th century wartime law.

Maryland resident Kilmar Abrego Garcia — who was granted legal status in 2019 — was deported to the Central American prison in March in what the White House described as “ an administrative error,” according to the Associated Press.

Garcia’s case is playing out in court.

On April 4, a U.S. district judge in Maryland described Garcia’s deportation as unlawful and ordered the government to return him by April 7, according to NBC News. But, on the day of the deadline, the Supreme Court temporarily paused the lower court judge’s order.