Buyers’ Remorse In Immigrant Communities— Trump Approval Down In Miami-Dade And Orange Counties

Anti-communist Venezuelans and Cubans in Miami-Dade bought into right-wing propaganda about Democrats being commie-symps and their communities turned out in big numbers for Trump last year. They were the driving force that flipped Miami-Dade from blue to red:

• 2008- Obama 57.8%

• 2012- Obama 61.6%

• 2016- Hillary 63.2%

• 2020- Biden 53.3%

• 2024- Trump 55.2%

Today, as Trump’s xenophobia and racism, unmasked, has come to the fore, some are sorry, especially Venezuelans, that they voted for him. Many Venezuelan-Americans in Doral, Florida’s largest Venezuelan community, felt “beyond betrayed” after Trump ended Temporary Protected Status (TPS) for over 500,000 Venezuelans in early 2025. Many Venezuelans are “frantic” and “scared” as the policy threatened deportation. They feel betrayed after Republicans pledged that Trump would only target undocumented immigrants, not those with legal protections like TPS. Now they feel used, powerless and angry about the potential deportation of family, friends and neighbors, questioning why legal immigrants were being targeted despite contributing to the country. 

While Cuban Americans generally supported Trump (68% in Miami-Dade according to the 2024 FIU Cuba Poll), some are pissed off over his immigration crackdowns, particularly the end of the humanitarian parole program, which benefited over 111,000 Cubans. Despite 62% of Cuban-American Republicans supporting the program, Trump’s pledge to terminate it caused unease among those who valued it for family members. Cuban-American GOP representatives like Maria Elvira Salazar and Mario Díaz-Balart are facing serious constituent pressure since Trump ended parole and TPS programs. Still, the Cuban community, benefiting from the Cuban Adjustment Act of 1966, is less vulnerable to deportation, than Venezuelans so regret is less widespread but present among those tied to parole programs or broader Latino concerns. 

Something similar is happening in the L.A. area, especially Orange County, which has been home to anti-Communist Southeast Asians for decades. And like the Cubans and Venezuelans, many— particularly the Vietnamese— tend to vote more Republican than other Asian-Americans. Yesterday, Melissa Gomez reported that ICE is starting to round up and deport people from this community. “A growing number of Southeast Asian immigrants in Los Angeles and Orange counties,” she wrote, “whose deportation orders have been on indefinite hold for years are being detained, and in some cases, deported after showing up for routine check-ins at U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement offices, according to immigrant attorneys and advocacy groups. In recent months, a number of Cambodian, Laotian and Vietnamese immigrants have been told that deportation orders that had been stayed— in some cases for decades— are now being enforced as the Trump administration seeks to increase the number of deportations.”

These are primarily adults who had gotten into trouble decades ago as teenagers. “[U]nder longstanding policies, these immigrants have been allowed to remain in the U.S. with the condition that they checked in with ICE agents regularly to show they were working and staying out of trouble. The check-ins generally start out monthly, but over time become an annual visit. According to the Asian Law Caucus, as of 2024 there were roughly 15,100 Cambodians, Laotians and Vietnamese nationals living in this situation across the U.S.” Trump would like to deport them.

“People are very worried about their check-ins. They are dedicated to complying with their reporting requirements and want to continue to comply as they have been doing for years, but they are also afraid to report based on what they have seen on the news,” said Lee Ann Felder-Heim, a staff attorney at the Asian Law Caucus.

Connie Chung Joe, the chief executive of Asian Americans Advancing Justice Southern California, said that in the last month her organization has been made aware of at least 17 community members in Los Angeles and Orange counties who have gone in for scheduled check-ins, only to be detained or deported.

“These are folks who’ve been here for decades,” Chung Joe said. “It just breaks the community and their families apart.”

Orange County is home to the largest diaspora of Vietnamese outside of their home country, many of them refugees who fled the fall of Saigon. The county’s Little Saigon is home to more than 100,000 Vietnamese Americans. In addition, tens of thousands of Cambodians and Laotians have settled in the Los Angeles area, according to the Pew Research Center.

Many Southeast Asian refugees were brought over as children, and not all got adequate support as they coped with the upheaval, said Laura Urias, program director at Immigrant Defenders Law Center. Some fell in with gangs as they struggled to assimilate, and that’s when they got caught up in the criminal system.

Although they may have gotten in trouble as youths, Urias said, many served their time and went on to get jobs and put down roots.

In one instance, a Cambodian immigrant went in for his ICE check-in and came out with an order to produce a plane ticket to Cambodia within 60 days, she said. Urias said none of the center’s clients have been deported at this point, but that she has heard about people without legal representation who were deported after a check-in.

“It’s definitely something that we haven’t really seen before,” Urias said. “It aligns with the overall message that this administration came in with— threatening to deport as many people as possible.”

In 2024 a conservative Vietnamese-American Democrat, Derek Tran was elected to Congress, defeating 2-term Republican incumbent Michelle Steel in Orange County’s 45th district. From what I saw of his campaign, it was all about Vietnamese, Vietnamese, Vietnamese. It was one of the closest congressional races of the cycle, Tran winning the D+1 district by just 653 votes out of over 315,000 cast— 50.1% to 49.9%. The district had trended slightly redder:

• 2016- Hillary 54-41%

• 2020- Biden 52-46%

• 2024- Kamala 49-48%

Presumably, Trump’s ugly xenophobia will help Democrats up and down the ballot win in CA-45 next year, despite Tran’s easily predictable putrid right-of-center voting record.