>> good evening and welcome to Metro focus.

I am Jenna Flanagan.

The latest Siana poll of New Yorkers focuses on migrants coming into the state indicating the issue number and say top concern for most voters.

84 percent of voters view the influx of migrants as a serious problem.

Opal asks New Yorkers for perspectives on various other important issues including the war in Israel and Gaza, the state's current direction and the 2024 presidential candidates.

On the last question the findings reveal troubling numbers for Democrats and Joe Biden.

Joining us to discuss the poll is Siena College pollster Steve Greenberg.

Welcome to Metro focus.

>> thank you for having me.

>> let's start with the top issue and that would be the migrants coming into New York City and different parts of New York State.

What did the poll tell us?

>> one of the most important topline findings is 84% of New Yorkers think what is going on right now with the influx of migrants is a serious problem.

57% of New York workers say it is very serious and seldom do we see issues where we have four out of five Democrats, Republicans, independents, upstate, downstate, all saying this is a serious problem.

The other issue in relation to this was we pulled one of the statements that Mayor Adams recently made talking about how he see is the end of almost every problem but not this problem.

He thinks the migrant issue will destroy New York City so we asked voters if they agree or disagree with the mayor that this could destroy New York City and buy a 58-32% margin voters agreed with the mayor.

Here we do see a partisan divide.

81% of Republicans agree with the Democratic mayor, 60% of independent voters agreed, but Democrats are divided.

44 percent agreed, 42% disagreed.

>> what about Latino voters, how do they factor into this?

>> 60% of white voters, 57% of black voters and 51% of Latino voters all agree with the mayor that this could destroy New York City.

>> I think that is surprising for a lot of people.

>> absolutely and if we go back to the first question, well over 70% of Latinos say this recent influx is a serious problem for the state.

The other thing we did this asked voters to rate the job that the mayor of New York City is doing, the governor of New York and the Biden administration in Washington and rate the job that those three executives are doing to address this issue.

Voters give failing grades to all of them.

37% approve of the job she is doing, 52% disagree.

For Mayor Adams it is 37% approve.

And voters say they have the most wrath for the Biden administration.

Only 29 percent of voters approve of the job the Biden administration is doing to address the issue compared to nearly two thirds, 64%, who disapprove.

>> what do those numbers tell us?

A voter who might voice disappointment does not mean a votive who stays home or votes for the other party or does it?

>> certainly not and certainly not this far out from an election.

We still have more than 12 months until election day in 2024.

A poll is a snapshot in time.

This is how voters feel right now but if we go back one month, nobody thought at least not that I had heard that there is going to be a major Middle East war potentially.

Events change the way people think so we have one year until election day, a year worth of events to happen that will impact how the voters feel when they go to the polls next fall.

>> of course, of course.

So when we talk about the impact do we have any idea of where Latino voters in the snapshot are falling?

>> Latinos give Mayor Adams a disapproval rating, 44% disagree -- disapprove, 42% approve.

For the governor, 42% disapprove, 41 percent approve and for the Biden administration it is almost two to one, 60% disapprove compared to 33% who approve.

>> wow, OK. What did we learn about where the state is headed?

New York City being a very big part of the state but miss there apprehension about the state of New York State?

>> absolutely, the first question Siena asks is the same every time.

Do you think New York State is on the right track or headed in the wrong direction?

Right now only 34% of New Yorkers think the state is on the right track.

52% think we are headed in the wrong direction.

A serious partisan divide, 78 percent of Republicans, 58% of independents think the state is headed in the wrong direction but Democrats, a plurality but not majority, 47% think the state is on the right track but New Yorkers are not happy about the direction of the state and they are more negative about the direction of the country.

25 percent of New Yorkers think the United States is on the right track, nearly two thirds, 65% say the country is headed in the wrong direction.

>> speaking of how New Yorkers view where the country is headed I wonder what they think about international issues.

We are funding to international war fronts, Ukraine and Israel.

What to the polls say about where New Yorkers are with those big issues?

>> New Yorkers are supportive of aid for Ukraine and Israel.

We asked do you support or oppose more military and economic aid for Ukraine and then the same for Israel.

51% of New Yorkers support increased aid for Ukraine compared to 38% who oppose it.

For Israel it is even stronger, 57% support, 32% oppose.

Democrats are similar on both issues.

61% support aid for Ukraine, 57% support aid for Israel but Republicans by a 56-35 percent margin oppose increased aid to Ukraine but by a two to one they support aid for Israel.

>> what does that tell us?

People are fine with finding certain wars but exhausted by others?

>> I don't know that they're getting exhausted and a majority of New Yorkers including a strong majority of Democrats and Independents support increased aid for Ukraine and what we are seeing in New York is a lot of Republicans in New York like what we see out of Washington and the house Republicans, the former president has indicated he is not supportive of Ukrainian aid, so there is a lot of consternation we say from Republicans as to whether they want to support or oppose but a majority of New York Republicans oppose aid to Ukraine.

>> final question and speaking of consternation or concern, crime in New York, I understand that was a poll question.

How did that turn out?

>> for the last several years Siena would ask voters how serious a problem is crime in New York State and your community.

We had not asked in the last several months, we got tied up on other issues so when we went back to voters this month what we said was over the last year would you say the crime problem in New York State has gotten problem, stay the same, gotten worse?

Only 9% think the crime problem has gotten better, more than a quarter, 28%, think it stayed about the same.

59% of New Yorkers, a clear majority think the crime problem has gotten worse over the last year.

>> is interesting because you say in the state.

Where is there a difference between upstate and downstate or was that ubiquitous?

>> there is some difference but New York City voters, 51 percent of New York City voters think it has gotten worse, crime has gotten worse.

64% of downstate suburban voters and the same percentage of upstate voters think that the problem in the state has gotten worse.

>> just to bring that back to our original topic, the migrant issue, which I do not want to attempt to tied to what we were talking about but I wonder if there was a difference between the way upstate New Yorkers and New York Cityers, the difference between the way the influx of migrants is being viewed?

Not all parts of the state are feeling it equally.

>> that is true but what is interesting is when we look at the migrant issue we see on many of the questions very little variation between Democrats and Republicans.

So there is a strong feeling among all New Yorkers that this is a problem that elected officials are not addressing adequately and that they would like to see it addressed.

It is not unlike the crime problem if we go back one year and think back to the gubernatorial campaign between Hogle and this is Eldon, crime was that issue last year.

This year it feels like a migrant issue but when we asked about crime voters say it is getting worse.

>> wow, well for me the big take away is the little difference between Democrats and Republicans, one of the few times that we hear that phrase.

Steve, thank you so much for taking the time to break down the latest Siena College poll.

We look forward to hearing more snapshots of where voters are as we head toward the eventual 2024 presidential and congressional etc.

elections.

Thank you so much for joining us.

>> thank you for having me, we will be pulling almost every month between now and then.

>> we look forward to hearing about it, thank you.