By: Ilana Siyance

The deep-blue Empire State is showing high approval ratings for our Republican President.

As reported by the NY Post, a new poll shows that President Donald J. Trump’s current approval rating in New York State is the highest it’s been throughout since his first term. The latest Siena College poll, released Monday, shows that Trump is enjoying an approval rating in NYS of 41 percent, which matches his highest ever in the survey, previously attained in Dec. 2016, the month before he became president for the first time.

Trump’s approval rating topped Gov. Kathy Hochul’s approval, which was at 39 percent, per the poll. Trump’s approval rating is getting a boost from his tough-on-immigration stance. The poll showed that an overwhelming 79 percent of voters support his effort to deport illegal migrants living in the US who have been convicted of a crime. A majority of New Yorkers questioned, or 54 percent, also said they believe Trump will do an “excellent” or “good” job securing America’s borders.

“President Trump has not been popular in his former home state for more than a decade. And while that is still true, Trump now has his best favorability rating, 41-56%, since the month before he took office the first time, December 2016, when his favorability rating was 41-53%,” Sienna pollster Steven Greenberg said, summarizing the results. “Currently, Republicans view him favorably, 83-13%, while Democrats view him unfavorably, 17-81%. Independents are in the middle, 48-46%,” Greenberg added.

The results come on the heels of the first aggressive federal intervention, which came as promised last Tuesday. Heavily armed federal immigration agents stormed through NYC with warrants, targeting migrants wanted for murder, kidnapping and other dangerous crimes. One of those arrested was Anderson Zambrano-Pacheco, 25, the alleged ringleader of the violent Venezuelan prison gang named Tren de Aragua. In the early hours of the morning, Homeland Security Investigations officers had raided an Ogden Avenue apartment building in The Bronx, across the street from P.S. 11, making the arrest.

The gang leader had a slew of charges against him— including kidnapping, burglary and menacing – in Colorado over the summer, as reported by the NY Post. President Trump’s new Homeland Security secretary, Kristi Noem, shared footage on social media of a man whom she called a “criminal alien with kidnapping, assault & burglary charges”, as he was led in handcuffs following one of the NYC raids.

“Dirtbags like this will continue to be removed from our streets,” Noem noted with the clip. Per Fox News, since Trump took office, over 7,400 illegal migrants have been arrested in just nine days across several sanctuary cities including NYC, Chicago and Boston, per Fox News.

On Monday, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth set out for his first trip to the US-Mexico border. Per the Post, the Trump administration has beefed up its military presence at the border — with some 1,500 active-duty troops sent in last month to join the roughly 2,200 US National Guard and Reserve personnel already there. The troops aim to enhance security and assist in the airlift of some 5,000 undocumented migrants from detention centers in San Diego and El Paso, Ca. The administration has already begun to fulfill its promises, using military aircraft to deport migrants back to Latin America.

“Whatever is needed at the border will be provided,” Hegseth said last week. “The Defense Department will support the defense of the territorial integrity of the United States of America’s southern border” he said.