This piece is part of MTFP’s 2026 poll week, where we’re exploring data on how Montana voters feel about their elected officials, environmental concerns, immigration enforcement and other issues.
One-hundred percent of Montana Democrats expressed disapproval of Republican President Donald Trump’s approach to immigration in a Montana Free Press-Eagleton poll conducted in late December and early January — while 94% of Montana Republicans expressed support.
Regardless of political party, an overwhelming majority of Montana voters, 85%, expressed strong feelings one way or the other about the issue. About 49% of respondents overall said they strongly approved and another 37% strongly disapproved, leaving only about 15% without a strong stance on the issue.
The poll was conducted before the fatal shootings of U.S. citizens Renee Good and Alex Pretti intensified protests over immigration enforcement actions in Minneapolis. It was also before the Jan. 25 arrest of business owner Roberto Orozco-Ramirez in the small eastern Montana town of Froid.
Republicans were substantially more likely to support Trump’s immigration policies than Democrats or independents.
While 86% of Republicans “strongly approve” and another 8% “somewhat approve” of Trump’s approach to immigration, 0% of Democrats approved at all or had no opinion. Independents, meanwhile, were split at 51% “strongly disapprove” and 27% “strongly approve.”
About half of poll respondents also said they strongly supported collaboration between federal immigration authorities and Montana Highway Patrol. A similar number supported federal immigration authorities collaborating with both county sheriff’s offices and local police departments.
Collaboration between U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and local government has become a contested issue in Helena, which is under investigation by Montana Attorney General Austin Knudsen over whether the city commission’s resolution to restrict police from cooperating with ICE violates a 2021 bill that banned sanctuary cities.
The MTFP-Eagleton poll surveyed 801 registered voters through telephone interviews and text-to-web questionnaires. Data was collected from Dec. 23, 2025 to Jan. 3, 2026. The poll, which was weighted to reflect the demographics of the state’s voters, has an overall margin of error of plus or minus 4.1 percentage points.
This piece is part of the Montana Insights project, which is commissioning rounds of polling to help MTFP readers understand public sentiment on key Montana policy issues. Further findings from the Dec. 2025-Jan. 2026 poll are available here.
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