FED UP: Majority now back Muslim travel ban; divide on Muslim neighborhood patrols. [archive]

Research from YouGov/HuffPost indicates that the public is divided on whether or not law enforcement should ‘patrol and secure’ Muslim neighborhoods in the United States. 45% support it while 40% oppose it, with most Democrats (57%) opposed and a large majority of Republicans (74%) in favor of the policy.

Despite the narrow support for proactive patrolling of Muslim areas, a significant majority of Americans (63% to 24%) say that it is better to work with Muslim communities to identify potential terrorists than it is to rely on putting these communities under intense surveillance. Even most Republicans (52%) prefer cooperation to surveillance.

(Too bad Muslims don’t cooperate. See the earlier post, Former FBI Counterterrorism Agent: We’ve Received ‘Nearly Zero Help’ from U.S. Muslim Community Since 9/11.)

Today most Americans (51%) now support banning Muslims entering the United States. This is slightly up from the 45% support [archive] when the question was first asked after Donald Trump proposed the ban in December 2015. This is largely a result of a big jump in support for a ban among independents (42% to 62%), as Democratic opposition and Republican support is largely unchanged over the last four months.