The Biggest Issue on Americans’ Minds Is Also a Tough One to Agree On

I don’t know how to make sense of it.

It just hurts my heart.

It should not be that hard.

Americans have argued about immigration for decades, often with anger, fear and racial resentment. But if the debate stands out today, it is for another sentiment coursing through the conversation: exhaustion.

Decades of neglect and political stalemate have left the American immigration system broken in ways that defy simple solutions. The number of people crossing the border has climbed. Many are settling in cities far from the border, making an abstract problem suddenly concrete for some Americans.

And now comes a presidential election.

Ahead of Super Tuesday, when Americans in 15 states are casting their first ballots of the year, we talked to voters about immigration, the issue that has jumped to the top of the list of their concerns.

The conversations revealed worry, frustration, confusion and suspicion. There was appetite for the hard-line approach pushed by Donald J. Trump, the likely Republican nominee who has made his career on anti-immigrant policies and rhetoric. There was empathy for migrants who many believe have no other options. And there was little hope that President Biden might figure out a way out of the morass. Notably, the solutions voters proposed didn’t fit neatly into either party’s ideological box.