WASHINGTON _ After more than two years of trumpeting draconian policies that by his own measure have failed to deter U.S. immigration, President Donald Trump now says he wants to take an even "tougher" tack on border security policy.
Trump pushed out his second Homeland Security secretary, Kirstjen Nielsen, on Sunday, largely out of frustration over a spike in asylum-seeking Central American families. And he repeated his threats to close the southern border.
"Country is FULL!" he tweeted. "... Will Close Southern Border If necessary ... "
For Trump and his closest aides, particularly immigration hard-liner and White House policy adviser Stephen Miller, tough rhetoric is a red-meat handout to a base they see as critical to winning back the White House in 2020.
Nielsen's departure has created a slew of questions about whether Trump would try to become even more aggressive in restricting asylum claims and other policies that he has pursued, including resuming the separation of migrant children from their families.
Still, hemmed in by U.S. immigration law, a Democratic-led House, and the realities of the border, critics and supporters alike wonder where the president can actually go from here.
Mark Krikorian of the Center for Immigration Studies, which supports less immigration to the United States, said there's not much more a Homeland Security secretary can do with the ultimate decision-making coming from the White House.
"I'm just not sure that it's something a different DHS secretary can do rather than the White House making the decision," he said.
Krikorian does not believe shutting down the border will be back on the agenda any time soon, given that Trump "made the bluster" and then retreated.
"Literally absent Congress and the courts, every option has been exhausted," said Blain Rethmeier, who worked in President George W. Bush's White House with Nielsen and helped her and former Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly navigate their confirmations.
"Stephen Miller and the administration ran out of options and resorted to eating their own," he said.
For her part, Nielsen made clear Monday that she won't be abandoning her consistent support of the president's policies and won't be trying to undermine him after her departure later this week.
Outside her townhouse in Alexandria, Va., Nielsen said she shares "the president's goal of securing the border" and agrees there is a "humanitarian and security crisis."
Nielsen had been among the most controversial of Trump's Cabinet secretaries, given Trump's mandate to push boundaries on immigration, an issue that he considers central to his political standing. But her vocal defense was not enough to save her job.
