Share of Mexicans With Favorable View of US Rebounds From 2010 Low Bruce Drake - Pew Research Center
go to original October 31, 2013

The share of Mexicans with a favorable view of the U.S. has risen 22 percentage points since passage of Arizona’s restrictive immigration law in 2010.

One political irritant between the U.S. and Mexico over the years has been immigration policy – an issue that is currently before lawmakers on Capitol Hill.

In 2010, Mexicans reacted negatively when Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer signed into law a controversial measure to crack down on illegal immigration, a measure that also caused heated debate in the U.S.  Mexico’s then-President Felipe Calderon declared the law “an obstacle to the solution of the common problems of the border region and in North America as a whole.” The measure made failure to carry immigration documents a crime and empowered the police to detain anyone suspected of being in the U.S. illegally.

Nearly two-thirds (65%) of Mexicans surveyed after the law’s enactment had heard about it, and the image of the U.S. in Mexico took a nosedive, according to a 2010 Pew Research Center survey. Prior to enactment of the law, 62% of Mexicans had a favorable view of their northern neighbor while only 27% held a negative one. After the measure became law, 48% of Mexicans registered a negative view of the U.S. while 44% expressed a positive one. The survey did not specifically ask if the law was the reason for the change in opinions.

Read the rest at Pew Research Center

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