WASHINGTON, June 22 Most respondents to a UPI-Zogby International poll want to repeal the law granting automatic citizenship to anyone born in the United States.
Even children born to illegal immigrants are considered U.S. citizens if they are born on U.S. soil. There has been concern the policy was being abused with families of newborns claiming they needed to stay in the United States with the infant, and residency is granted because the baby is a U.S. citizen.
Some 38.2 percent of those asked strongly disagreed with the policy and another 17.4 percent somewhat disagreed. Another 26.8 percent said they strongly agreed with the policy and 14.3 percent somewhat agreed.
Nearly half -- 47.2 percent -- of the pool subset of Hispanic voters strongly agreed with the policy and 31.8 percent strongly disagreed.
More the half of the overall pool of 8,300 U.S. residents said if parents who are illegal aliens are deported, their children should go with them -- even if they are U.S. citizens. Another 31 percent said children should be allowed to stay in the United States while their parents undergo naturalization and 3.2 percent said deport the parents and place the children in U.S. foster care.
The Zogby interactive poll was conducted June 15-18 and has a margin of error of 1.1 percentage points.
Copyright 2007 by UPI
