Trump: No Amnesty, Deportations of the 'Worst of the Worst' Will Continue

President Trump says his administration will keep deporting the "worst of the worst" and will not accept any immigration deal that includes amnesty, the Hindustan Times reported.

"We have a very strong deportation policy. There is no amnesty," Trump said at an impromptu White House press conference on Monday, The Daily Signal reported. Yahoo News reported that the President described the policy as very strong and rejected amnesty.

The remarks were a course correction. A day earlier, as Republicans sorted through their midterm losses, Trump said his deportation crackdown had been "too tough," France 24 reported. The comment, made in a television interview over the weekend, rattled conservatives who see border enforcement as one of the central promises of his presidency. By Monday the President was making clear that the policy had not changed.

Whatever the words in a television interview, the enforcement itself has kept going. Yahoo News reported that arrests by Immigration and Customs Enforcement have continued unabated despite the President's comments. And the Department of Homeland Security has kept up its "worst of the worst" effort, spotlighting illegal immigrants with the most serious criminal records, including murderers and drug traffickers, in its latest roundups, Just the News reported.

For conservative voters, border security is not one issue among many. It is a test of whether Washington keeps its word. Many remember 1986, when Congress granted legal status to millions in exchange for enforcement promises that were never kept, and the border problem grew. That history is why the word "amnesty" lands so hard with the President's supporters, and why even a hint of a deal draws an instant reaction.

The fight over immigration is about to get sharper, not softer. Democrats take control of both chambers of Congress in January, and they have their own ideas about legal status for people already in the country. Any bill that reaches the President's desk will be a bargain between two sides that see the issue very differently. Trump's message this week sets his terms in advance: enforcement first, criminals out first, and no amnesty.

Watch whether the White House keeps ICE operations at their current pace through the holidays, and whether congressional Democrats try to tie immigration changes to spending bills that must pass. Watch, too, how Republicans who lost seats in the midterms talk about the issue. Their choices will shape the next two years of the border debate.

For now, the President has told his voters what they wanted to hear. The next test is whether the policy matches the words.