Swing State Debates Episode Two: Talking Immigration in Arizona

My favorite thing about being the moderator in our new series Swing State Debates is that it’s my job to ask questions—not to have the answers. 

I was particularly grateful for my role when we went to Arizona to shoot this week’s episode, which is about immigration—a top concern among voters heading into November, according to poll after poll. It’s an issue that has vexed politicians for decades, and it’s not hard to understand why. 

Under the Biden administration, an average of two million undocumented migrants crossed the border annually until this year, recalling levels not seen since the ‘90s. Illegal immigration, and Trump’s promise to “Build the Wall,” were centerpieces of his first, second, and now third presidential campaigns. 

I arrived in Phoenix expecting a fiery conversation. And yes, in this debate, among eight participants gathered in a Methodist church, all with different views on immigration, there was plenty of intense disagreement. But there was also a surprising amount of common ground. 

For all the divisive rhetoric around immigration, my sense is that most Americans are searching for a middle ground—somewhere between an effectively open border and a system that, long before Donald Trump came along, enacted needlessly cruel policies on some of the world’s most vulnerable people. 

The ideologically diverse group on this week’s episode of Swing State Debates includes two DACA recipients, a former border patrol agent, an immigration attorney, and a Trump-supporting advocate for immigrant families. We talked about everything from the moral argument for a “closed border” and the role of drug cartels, to what policies a Trump or a Harris administration might enact vis-à-vis the border. 

For all the differences of opinion on these questions there was, at the very least, some mutual understanding. And that, surely, is the point of conversations like this.

This series is presented with support from the David Merage Foundation and Evoke Media. For more information, please visit weareevokemedia.com. Click here to watch episode one of the series, a debate on education in Florida.

As well as hosting Swing State Debates, Ben Kawaller is the host of The Free Press series Ben Meets America! To learn more about that series, click here.