As stricter immigration enforcement policies continue under President Donald Trump into 2026, the impact of his administration’s first-year activity since he began his second term is being felt across the city. Overall, about 1 in 7 Houston-area residents say they know someone detained and potentially deported in 2025, and among Hispanic residents that number is higher at 1 in 4. There has also been a corresponding shift in attitude away from mass deportation with most Houston-area residents, including a majority of conservatives, saying they prefer expanded pathways to citizenship over mass deportation, according to new data from Rice University’s Kinder Institute for Urban Research.
The survey, conducted in October and November 2025 after several months of heightened undocumented immigration enforcement, finds that support for citizenship pathways outweighs support for mass deportation across nearly the entire political spectrum.
The findings come from the first Houston-area survey conducted after the start of increased undocumented immigration enforcement in 2025. Researchers surveyed the same residents earlier in the year, allowing for the ability to measure how individuals’ attitudes changed over time.
“Overall, there were small but important shifts in the attitudes of people in 2025, and while the majority of Houston-area residents had always wanted to see increased pathways to citizenship, by the end of the year not a single group had majority support for mass deportations,” said Dan Potter, director of the Kinder Institute’s Houston Population Research Center and one of the researchers on the study.
Compared with responses from January and February 2025, the largest shifts in attitudes were among conservatives. Even among residents identifying as extremely conservative, there was a 20% movement away from mass deportation and toward increased pathways to citizenship. While extremely conservative respondents remain the only political group in which mass deportation receives plurality support, the gap has narrowed.
Views on immigrants’ economic contributions also strengthened. At the beginning of 2025, 69% of residents said immigrants contribute more to the U.S. economy than they take. By fall 2025, that figure rose to 77%.
Beyond changes in people’s attitudes about mass deportation, the study released today also provides some early estimates about the size of the deportation efforts underway in the Houston area and around the country.
Nearly 15% of Houston-area residents report personally knowing someone who was detained and potentially deported in 2025. The likelihood varies significantly by community. About 1 in 4 Hispanic residents say they know someone detained. That compares with 1 in 11 Black residents, 1 in 12 white residents and 1 in 17 Asian residents.
It is also more common among residents earning less than $35,000 annually with 1 in 4 reporting a personal connection compared with 1 in 10 among those earning $100,000 or more.
The data for these studies were collected before the high-profile immigration enforcement events in early 2026. It also provides the most recently available information on how Houston-area residents are responding to enforcement activities.
“With such a rapidly changing landscape, it is sometimes difficult for research to keep up, but what our research makes clear is that Houston-area residents are unimpressed by federal efforts and want to see the issue of illegal immigration addressed by incorporating people, not kicking them out,” Potter said.
The full reports are available below:
“Personal connection to individuals impacted by mass deportation efforts” and “Changes in attitudes toward mass deportation and immigration in 2025.”
For media inquiries or to schedule an interview, contact Kat Cosley Trigg at kat.cosley.trigg@rice.edu.