Immigration is hitting home for Mass. voters. Will it impact elections?

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I’ve reported on lots of immigration stories in Massachusetts over the last decade. For most of that time, what little political attention the issue got locally was connected to events at the southern border, from the wave of unaccompanied minors during President Obama’s second term to the Trump administration separating families.

A lot has changed since then. The arrival of thousands of families to Massachusetts over the past two years has made immigration a legit factor in Bay State politics. Leaders on Beacon Hill have diverted hundreds of millions of dollars into the state’s emergency shelter system, while also repeatedly rolling back its shelter guarantee for families.

A poll this spring found that Bay Staters now say the “single biggest issue facing state government” is immigration. This was surprising — so-called “pocketbook issues” like housing and the cost of living have typically been the top concern of Massachusetts voters. But now, for the first time pollsters can recall, immigration has risen to the top of the list.

“Immigration has been a top issue for Republicans for a long time, both in Massachusetts and nationally,” said Rich Parr, a researcher with MassINC Polling. “I think what we’re seeing in this survey is that it’s starting to cross over into Democrats and independents because of the budget impact.”

While this could prove to be a crucial part of national elections, the impact on politics here in the bluest state in the country depends on where you look.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren and the rest of the state’s all-Democratic congressional delegation are widely considered safe — though Warren’s Republican challengers, Quincy City Councilor Ian Cain and Marine veteran/lawyer John Deaton, have both made the “border crisis” part of their pitches.

Republicans’ bigger opportunity may be at the local level. Take state Sen. Peter Durant of Spencer, who flipped a central Massachusetts seat last November after making immigration central to his campaign, as my colleague Anthony Brooks recently reported. And this fall, Republicans are placing hopes in the Taunton-area race to replace longtime Democratic Sen. Marc Pacheco, where GOP candidate Kelly Dooner is pushing to amend the state’s right-to-shelter law.

Does that mean the Democrats’ long-held State House supermajority is at risk? Not likely. (After all, nearly two-third of incumbents in the Legislature don’t even have a challenger on the ballot this year.) But we are beginning to see impacts on the margins.