President Donald Trump ended the first year of his second term with an approval rating below 40%, according to a Gallup poll. Bryan Stalder, the creative director of The Northeast News, said the president is doing “excellent.”
“I think he's far exceeded my expectations,” Stalder said.
KCUR's Up To Date recently asked local residents who voted for Trump about how they feel about his policies and agenda during his second term so far.
Trump entered the White House in January 2025 ready to move quickly on his “America First” agenda. A selling point for many voters was his promise to secure the southern border and putting a stop to illegal immigration.
By the next month, monthly border crossings from Mexico fell from 60,000 to below 12,000.
“If you’re going to talk about the southern border, I think he’s done a stellar job,” said Michael Bushnell, a retired publisher and editor of The Northeast News.
According to the Department of Homeland Security, more than 675,000 people have been deported and an estimated 2.2 million have opted for self-deportation from the country. A New York Times analysis estimates the number of deportations to be lower.
The president said his administration would target people for deportation with a violent criminal record or gang affiliation. However, an internal DHS document obtained and analyzed by CBS News found that less than 14% of immigration arrests met that criteria.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement and DHS agents have also sparked protests for their tactics and sometimes violent response to protesters, which escalated in Minneapolis with the killings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti.
Stalder said he mostly approves of how ICE has operated.
“I think that there were some mistakes that happened in Minnesota,” Stalder said. “Those two people shouldn't have died, but I'm not just going to put that at ICE's doorstep. Local law enforcement should have arrested those people before ICE confronted them.”
Gresia Cabrera’s father was a political refugee from Cuba. Her family resettled in Kansas City when she was 11 years old. She said she supports how the administration is handling immigration.
Cabrera attributes Kansas City's drop in violent crimes and homicides to the presence of immigration enforcement officers.
“Let's just say, ever since there's been ICE sightings, I've heard way less shootings in the area I live in, the Historic Northeast,” Cabrera said. “It feels a lot safer.”
All three Trump voters who spoke with KCUR’s Up To Date also approved of the Trump administration’s deadly military strikes on boats in the Caribbean, despite ethical and legal questions about the right to due process.
“I think under the circumstances, I'm going to go right back to the drug boats, yeah, I love it,” Bushnell said. “You've got to send a strong message. And I think if you ask that question to anybody down on the Texas or Arizona border that has been directly impacted and had friends and family killed by cartel members. I'm all for it.”
Hear Up To Date's full conversation above. A note to listeners: Some statements made during this interview are false or could not be verified, but have been left in to understand the context and conversation.
- Gresia Cabrera, Kansas City resident
- Michael Bushnell, retired publisher and editor, The Northeast News
- Bryan Stalder, creative director, The Northeast News
