Fleeing for Their Lives: Reconsidering How Americans View Immigrants’ Reasons for Migrating

Abstract Politicians and media outlets often emphasize a distinction between migrants fleeing their home country for reasons linked to violence and migrants leaving to pursue economic opportunity. Americans are expected to be less welcoming towards immigrants who are perceived to be seeking economic opportunity relative to immigrants escaping violence. Using a national survey experiment, I test the hypothesis that violence and economic threats equally increase support for immigration when migrants face risks that force them to leave their home country. When harsh economic conditions are made clear, I find that Americans are more open to accepting immigrants fleeing economic deprivation than previously anticipated. While my results show that Americans are willing to prioritize immigrants facing poverty, I find minimal evidence that these favorable attitudes extend toward other protective immigration policies.