America's Not Divided

Vast majorities agree on the big shit — and even deep divides fade in the right light

Protesters at the Treasury Department on Feb. 4, 2025, express disapproval of Elon Musk, who is seen favorably by only 36% of the country. (Geoff Livingston photo / Creative Commons.)

The only thing everyone seems to agree on is that we don’t agree on anything. We’re divided, polarized.

But really, we’re not.

It seems like we are — and we feel so strongly against each other right now — not because of fundamental disagreements but because of how we’ve been conditioned to think about things.

A new AP-NORC poll of 1,147 adults in the country demonstrates this nicely. Just within this one poll, we can see how positions shift depending on how we’re asked to think about things. Let’s look at the hottest of hot topics.

Only a third of the country thinks we should reduce the number of legal immigrants. Fewer than that, 24%, believe we should let in more (assuming they still want to come — I’m kidding, lots of them still do!)

But the plurality — and this is consistent over the years — 43%, believe the number here should stay the same. Now, either this means 43% of the country has researched and thought deeply about this issue or it just doesn’t touch at least some of their lives in ways they see. In other words, it doesn’t affect them so they don’t see a need to change it.

Now, if we take the 43% who think the current level is perfect even for Goldilocks and add it to the 32% who want fewer legal immigrants here, that’s a massive 75% who are not in favor of letting in more, right? Three-quarters of the country openly xenophobic — opposing foreigners even though both parties agree we need more of at least some kinds of labor.

Well, not so fast, there, pardner.

Because when you drill down — and embed the questions with specifics, which change how people think about it — the numbers shift radically. Especially when the questions humanize our hypothetical and very real immigrants by ascribing to them motives that we all fucking get.

Specifically, when we’re asked to think not just about “immigrants” but immigrants who want to work and do so legally, suddenly now giving them guest visas is a moderate or high priority for 73% of the country. Abra-kadabra!

We’re slightly more cold-hearted when it comes to immigrants escaping violence at home (violence which may stem from destabilization due to U.S. policy or intervention). Maybe calling them refugees or tying them to violence creates negative associations — or simply isn’t believed — but even then, a massive 67% of the country still supports letting them in.

In short, those 75% who we thought and even said themselves that they oppose letting more immigrants in shift seismically simply when thinking about it differently.

Okay but what about undocumented immigrants? These are the boogeymen who invade our country in caravans so that they can take our jobs, eat our cats, rape our women, eat our dogs, kill our women, and take over entire cities in Colorado.

Here’s how people in our country think about undocumented immigrants, specifically, whether we should deport every single one of them:

We’re split, right? Strong feelings on either side of the issue are reported by the 23% who favor universal deportation and the 18% who oppose it. All told, 43% percent of us favor universal deportation, 37% oppose it and only one in five have no opinion.

Impossible to reconcile, right? Undocumented immigrants are either here or they’re not. We either try to deport them all or we don’t.

“All immigrants” leaves no wiggle room, right? Saints and sinners, losers and winners, whores and gamblers, lost souls, thieves and sweet souls departed, fools and kings. Kick ‘em all out.

Except it’s an incredibly shallow belief. And it’s mercurial, super-responsive to new input. The poll itself proves it. Because the same poll that explicitly asked about “all” then reminded its respondents that “all” means all.

That happened with a followup question about whether respondents supported deporting undocumented immigrants even if their kids are U.S. citizens. The numbers experience an earthquake.

Alakazam, a clear majority, 55%, now opposes deporting all. A whopping 72% is now not in favor of deporting everyone.

Did people not realize that some undocumented immigrants might have citizen kids? Or were they just not thinking about it? Either way, when they know and when they think about it, everything changes.

Drill down further and even some of the 28% who still support deporting everyone — even if it means separating them from their citizen kids — do not favor arresting these people without regard to the circumstances. Only 27% support arresting them in hospitals. Only 20% support arresting them in church and only 18% support arresting undocumented kids in school.

We are charitable, humane, and progressive when the cartoons used to trigger our knee-jerk responses are banished by real life and real people.

And when it comes to economic issues, we don’t have to reality-ify shit to see how progressive America is. The people are already here.

The AP-NORC poll asked whether we spend too much or too little on the following (the unlisted remainder think our spending levels are about right):

Education

• Too much: 12%

• Too little: 65%

Social Security

• Too much: 6%

• Too little: 67%

Medicare¹

• Too much: 9%

• Too little: 61%

Medicaid²

• Too much: 15%

• Too little: 55%

Assistance to the poor³

• Too much: 13%

• Too little: 62%

Let’s look at the cost of health care. The poll asks whether the federal government is to blame for high health-care costs, which is dumb without differentiating — is government to blame because it does too much? Or too little?

But a clear picture emerges from the other listed options.

Who do people blame? Capitalism. When you include moderate responsibility, the numbers are gargantuan.

How many people think drug and insurance companies aren’t ripping us the fuck off? Three percent. That’s roughly as many people as voted for Ross Perot. In 2024.

Ninety-seven percent of the country believes private health insurance bears some responsibility for high health-care costs. And the more responsibility we’re talking about, the more people agree:

• Slightly responsible: 7%

• Moderately responsible: 21%

• Very responsible: 23%

• Extremely responsible: 46%

A good-looking rich kid risked his life and/or the rest of his life to kill an insurance CEO. Americans hate insurance companies. Not because the companies abuse the insurance system but because the system itself — in a society that can afford to care for all — is a moral affront.

Only 3% of people disagree, and presumably that includes the half-million-plus who have jobs in health insurance.

Eradicating health insurance should be wildly popular and unifying. It’s only polarizing when we skip ahead to the solution. Government is obviously the only solution — as evidenced by the dozens of sane countries who figured that out and the none countries that made something else work.

The reason “government” is a non-starter as an alternative to health insurance is that a small handful of rich people have rendered government toxic. And, funny thing is, the less you let government do, the less it helps people, and the less reason people have to like it.

I have my own thoughts about how Democrats can lead people to common-sense positions without telling them what to think, just by telling them what’s true (see the immigrant polling example). But that won’t happen if Democrats until see their role as something more than congressional vote-casters.

(In fairness, some Democrats already do, including a number of progressives.)

I’ve lamented before — and will again — about how Vice President Kamala Harris’s unsuccessful strategists and consultants seem to have seen their mission as overcoming a hostile political environment rather than reshaping that environment to their advantage and Earth’s.

I have felt depressingly unseen in this view until I stumbled across a quotation from a previous president (courtesy of writer Daniel Lipinski, who may or may not be the same Lipinski who once served in Congress and with whom I disagree on many things). Things didn’t turn out well for this particular president, but he’s still viewed pretty favorably, so I want to share his thoughts on politics and leadership.

It was 1858. Abraham Lincoln was debating Stephen Douglas in their legendary series of debates in their Senate campaign. And Lincoln articulated a vision of political leadership that I suspect would benefit the Democratic establishment today:

“Public sentiment is everything. With public sentiment, nothing can fail; without it nothing can succeed. Consequently, he who molds public sentiment, goes deeper than he who enacts statutes or pronounces decisions.”

This is why media — including social and anti-social — are so important today, as always. But it’s also a prime directive for Democrats: They can do nothing until they start molding public sentiment. And they can’t do that until they know what shapes they wish to mold.

I have my own thoughts, but at a minimum it seems clear that Democrats should champion the same contours that the vast majority of Americans agree on. And we know what those are.

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Jonathan Larsen is a longtime TV news producer and journalist who co-created Up w/ Chris Hayes and wrote for Countdown with Keith Olbermann at MSNBC, helped launch CNN’s Anderson Cooper 360° and Air America Radio, and has also worked at The Daily Show with John Stewart and The Young Turks.

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1. Informing respondents that Medicare is health insurance for seniors.

2. Informing respondents that Medicaid is health insurance for low-income and disabled people.

3. That’s literally how vague the question was; so, theoretically, respondents are including government assistance for poor people to buy all that meth and Mary Jane that former Sen. Joe Manchin thought his state was doing.