Dozens of demonstrators gathered before sunrise on Thursday, Oct. 23, 2025, at the entrance of the narrow bridge to Coast Guard Island, a military base near Oakland, to protest ICE and National Guard deployment in the city. (Courtesy of the Rev. Jorge Bautista)
Aleja Hertzler-McCain
Though President Donald Trump's gains with Hispanic Christians were a crucial part of his winning coalition in the 2024 election, those gains are showing signs of eroding. A year after the election, a majority of Latino Catholics and Protestants have mostly negative views on Trump's job so far as president, especially when it comes to his immigration policies.
A Pew Research Center report on U.S. Latinos' views on the second Trump administration, compiled from two separate polls conducted in September and October and released on Monday (Nov. 24), revealed that the majority of U.S. Latinos (70%) disapprove of the way Trump is handling his job as president (55% very strongly disapprove and 15% not strongly disapprove), about two-thirds disapprove of his approach to immigration (65%, combined very strongly and not strongly) and 6 in 10 say his economic policies have made economic conditions worse (61%).
The report found these perspectives heightened among Latino Catholics, three-quarters of whom disapprove of Trump's job as president in his second term, and among religiously unaffiliated Latinos (76%). Latino Protestants are somewhat less likely to disapprove of the president's work so far in 2025 (58% disapprove).
Pew also found that about a third of Latinos reported struggling to afford different daily necessities, and 68% said the situation of Latinos in the U.S. today has gotten worse, compared to 26% in 2021.
Among Latino Christians, disapproval of Trump's immigration policies is significant: 7 in 10 Latino Catholics (70%) disapprove of how the Trump administration is handling immigration, while 55% of Latino evangelical Protestants also disapprove of the administration's approach to immigration. (Among religiously unaffiliated Latinos, 72% disapprove.)
Those opinions are being shaped as a majority of Latino Christians are witnessing the impacts of Trump's mass deportation campaign in their own neighborhoods. In religion data provided to RNS, six in 10 Latino Catholics (62%) said they had seen or heard of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) raids in their local area. Among Latino Protestants, 55% said that they had seen or heard about ICE raids in their local area.
More than 1 in 5 Latino Christians said they personally know someone who has been deported or detained by the U.S. federal government in the last year (22% of Catholics and 23% of Protestants).
But many more worry that they, a family member or close friend might be deported. Over half of Latino Catholics (56%) and about half (49%) of Latino Protestants said they had those fears.
In September, the Supreme Court released a temporary decision allowing immigration agents to stop people on the basis of race and ethnicity, leading even some Latinos with legal status to worry about being racially profiled. A ProPublica report from last month found that more than 170 U.S. citizens have been detained by immigration agents this year. More than 20 said they had been held for more than a day without being allowed to call a lawyer or their loved ones.
That fear is being felt in the pews. Nearly 1 in 10 Latino Catholics (9%) told Pew they had decreased going to religious services because they were worried they would be asked to prove their U.S. citizenship or immigration status, as did 6% of Latino Protestants. Pastors in areas that have been particularly targeted by immigration enforcement, however, have reported even sharper drops in church attendance to RNS.
Two percent of Latino Catholics and Latino Protestants said they were going to religious services more often because they were worried they would be asked to prove their U.S. citizenship or immigration status.
Some faith leaders have taken increasingly forceful public stances against the Trump administration's mass deportation policies.
Earlier this month, the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops released a "special message" for the first time since 2013, creating a statement and viral video in which they said they oppose "the indiscriminate mass deportation of people."
Many Catholic bishops are taking local actions to serve those who fear deportation and family separation, including accompanying people to immigration court appearances, collecting material resources for families struggling because they are unable to work or have lost a breadwinner to detention or deportation, leading vigils and releasing their own statements.
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Even Hispanic evangelical leaders aligned with Trump have spoken against the impacts of mass deportation campaigns. The Rev. Samuel Rodriguez, a Trump advisor and president of the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference, told RNS last month that he was urging the administration to recognize the "innocent people" being swept up as immigration agents are pressured to meet detention quotas. And the Rev. Tony Suárez, another Trump advisor and the vice president of the NHCLC, said at an RNS event that he was frustrated with White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller for immigration policies that are causing fear in Hispanic churches.
Other Hispanic evangelicals have been even more vocal against the Trump administration, publicly opposing his removal of protections against raids in houses of worship since the very first days of his second term.
The Rev. Gabriel Salguero, president of the National Latino Evangelical Coalition, said in July while promoting immigration reform bill the Dignity Act that evangelicals "are heartbroken by the large numbers of longstanding members of our churches and communities who are being detained in dehumanizing conditions, despite never having been charged with a crime," calling it a "crisis."
Most Latinos support deporting just some "immigrants living in the U.S. illegally," rather than all or none.
Nearly 6 in 10 Latino Catholics (57%) and about half of Latino Protestants (52%) told Pew that just some "immigrants living in the U.S. illegally" should be deported. Only 1 in 10 Latino Catholics (9%) said all immigrants living in the U.S. illegally should be deported — Latino Protestants were somewhat more likely to believe this (19%). A third of Latino Catholics (33%) and a quarter of Latino Protestants (27%), however, said immigrants living in the U.S. illegally should not be deported.
Religiously unaffiliated Latinos are more likely to say immigrants living in the U.S. illegally should not be deported (35%), while 53% support deporting some, and 12% support deporting all.
In this climate, some Latinos are considering serious changes. Four in 10 religiously unaffiliated Latinos (40%) have thought about moving somewhere outside the U.S. in the last six months. About 3 in 10 Latino Catholics (28%) and Latino Protestants (29%) have said the same.
The report was based on two surveys by Pew. The National Survey of Latinos, conducted Oct. 6 to 16, 2025, had a sample of 8,046 U.S. adults, including 4,923 Hispanics. The second survey was conducted Sept. 22 to 28, 2025, with a sample of 3,445 U.S. adults, including 629 Hispanics.
