The Left is once again in a tizzy, this time over comments made by Vice President JD Vance on the topic of immigration and assimilation. “What’s reasonable is to want to share a language with your neighbor. How do you borrow a cup of sugar? Resolve disagreements? Have a nice conversation? You need a common language, and in America, that language is English,” Vance said on X.

Trump-Vance immigration policies have a mixed approval rating among the general public. Voters overwhelmingly support a strong southern border, which “Team Trump” has delivered in short order. Ironically, taking the invasion of the U.S.-Mexico border off the table may hurt President Donald Trump’s approval on the matter long-term since the crisis has largely ended. According to polling data, a majority of Americans support the deportation of some, but not all, illegal immigrants. And while immigration is still Trump’s strongest polling matter, support has dropped below 50%, with 46.9% of voters supporting the president’s actions, via the RealClearPolitics average.

There are criticisms to be made of the administration’s handling of immigration, at least in terms of optics. Members of the Trump administration are doing themselves no favors by focusing on way-too-online messaging targeting GOP base voters, and corporate media will continue to claim Immigration and Customs Enforcement is engaging in racial profiling. But Vance hit on an extraordinarily popular position, and the administration would be wise to run with it.

Pollsters rarely poll this question, but semi-recent data suggest that a vast majority of Americans share Vance’s assertion that immigrants should be required to assimilate and learn the English language. Seventy-six percent of respondents to a 2015 poll said it is important for immigrants to learn English, and 66% said they believed immigrants were not assimilating to American customs.

Since the founding generation, assimilation has been an understood precondition of immigration, and for every hysterical anti-American leftist whining on social media, many normal voters view assimilation and a common language as commonsense measures. Fortunately for the GOP, the bombshell reports of rampant fraud being committed by Somali immigrants in Minnesota highlight the need for immigrants to assimilate into the American way of life. Surely kind-hearted Americans who support legal immigration did not sign up for an avalanche of more than 120,000 Somalis flooding the state and perpetrating vast fraud against its citizens.

The city of Dearborn, Michigan, is now roughly 55% Arab Muslim, up from around 30% in 2000. The Detroit suburb has become the face of the lack of assimilation among some immigrant populations, as chants of “death to America” have become common in the streets. Dearborn’s mayor even told a Christian citizen he was “not welcome” after the man raised concerns over the local government honoring a Muslim terrorist. 

OMAR HITS TRUMP OVER ‘UNHEALTHY OBSESSION’ WITH MINNESOTA’S SOMALI COMMUNITY

When Americans think about legal immigration, they think of the many groups of immigrants who came here from all over the world via Ellis Island and other immigration hubs, assimilated into their new culture, and succeeded to various degrees in the following decades. They don’t think of a pseudocaliphate being established in the middle of the upper Midwest.

The American public may never come around to Homeland Security Adviser Stephen Miller’s position of greatly limiting legal immigration and deporting every single immigrant here illegally. However, the majority of voters will never accept the Left’s goal of importing the third world with no expectation of assimilation whatsoever. Focusing on the importance of assimilation and sharing a common language with the folks whom we generously allow into our country is a winning message, and it would help the Trump administration achieve its immigration goals.

Brady Leonard (@bradyleonard) is a musician, political strategist, and host of The No Gimmicks Podcast.

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