BISMARCK, N.D. (North Dakota News Cooperative) – Support is strong across the board in North Dakota for cooperation between local law enforcement and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), according to the latest North Dakota Poll.
A total of 68% approve of the cooperation, while 28% do not.
Support was solid across the state, including Fargo/Cass County where 56% approve and 38% disapprove of local police cooperation with ICE.
Those numbers come despite local chaos and fatal shootings of two U.S. citizens in neighboring Minnesota in January during ICE actions primarily in Minneapolis.
The highest opposition comes from Democrats, with 62% disapproving of cooperation versus 34% who favor it.
“I was shocked,” State Senate Minority Leader Kathy Hogan (D-Fargo) said of the numbers.
“The messaging that the people ICE is arresting are only criminals, that’s not the truth,” Hogan said. “Because we haven’t had nearly the level of enforcement in North Dakota as we’ve had in Democratic states, they haven’t experienced what Chicago, or LA, or Minnesota have experienced.”
Speaker of the North Dakota House of Representatives Robin Weisz (R-Hurdsfield) said he was a little surprised that Democrat opposition of cooperation with ICE wasn’t even stronger and that overall support in Fargo/Cass County was as high as it was.
Among top items of current concern among North Dakotans, immigration ranked second only after the Iran conflict, with 17% saying it was the biggest issue the country now faces.
Election security concerns?
And while voter fraud and election security were among the least concerning, at 7% of voters, most respondents said their biggest concern when it comes to elections is election security.
A total of 61% said election security was the primary concern regarding elections, while 30% said voter access was the main concern.
Additionally, 75% of respondents said individuals voting in North Dakota should provide proof of citizenship before being allowed to vote in the state.
State law in North Dakota already requires individuals to present valid identification to vote because there is no formal voter registration process.
Valid identification is also cross-referenced with data from the North Dakota Secretary of State’s office along with North Dakota Department of Transportation records to ensure only U.S. citizens are voting.
State-issued identification documents like IDs or driver’s licenses held by non-citizens are also clearly marked, allowing election officials to flag attempts at illegal voting.
“We hear from people about our elections and fraud, but do they actually understand the process?” Weisz said. “A lot of it is about mail-in ballots. We probably have the most secure mail-in of any state in the nation.”
Weisz said the reaction is likely from what people are seeing in other states, then assuming things locally are in the same category.
“I don’t feel there’s any need to change our system,” Weisz said.
Hogan said a lot of this is part of the “nationalization” of politics that doesn’t necessarily reflect the realities on the ground in North Dakota.
“People have significant misperceptions about how elections work, and that there’s this idea we have all these (illegal) people voting,” Hogan said. “We have no voter fraud in North Dakota.”
Faith in local officials high
Most in North Dakota also feel public officials are accountable to the citizens they represent, particularly Republican respondents.
A total of 68% feel officials are either very or somewhat accountable. Another 29% felt they were either not too accountable or not accountable at all.
Voting age Democrats were the least rosy on local public officials, with 47% saying they were not too or not accountable at all, followed by 35% of Independents who felt the same way.
“Every survey I’ve seen, North Dakotans tend to have more faith in their public officials than the general population of the country,” said Mark Jendrysik, a political science professor at the University of North Dakota.
“I wonder if it is because, you’re out, you know these people, you run into them,” he said. “They’re around, perhaps not as much as they once were, but they’re not as distant from their constituents, say, than people might be in a much larger state.”
Faith in the representatives of their parties in the state is also high.
A total of 76% of Democrats feel the North Dakota Democratic–Nonpartisan League Party is generally representative of their views. Conversely, 69% of Republicans feel the North Dakota Republican Party generally represents their views.
Ideas on the national party representation, however, differ.
Among the 256 Republicans interviewed for the poll, 20% said the National Republican Party was too tied to the MAGA movement, 24% said it was too tied to party establishment and large money donors, while 54% said it was generally representative of most Republican voters.
For Democrats, 32% felt the National Democratic Party is too tied to liberal and progressive groups, 27% that it is too tied to establishment and large money donors, and 38% that the national party was generally representative of their views.
The North Dakota Poll was conducted by Mason-Dixon Polling & Strategy, Inc. of Jacksonville, Florida, from April 15 through April 19, 2026. A total of 625 North Dakota adult residents were interviewed statewide by telephone as part of the survey.
Republicans comprised 41% of those interviewed (256), followed by 37% Independents (233) and 22% Democrats (136).
The North Dakota Poll, sponsored by the North Dakota News Cooperative, is the only regular, nonpartisan statewide survey of eligible North Dakota voters and consumers.
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