US President Donald Trump said that his mass deportation of undocumented immigrants was “too tough,” according to an excerpt of an interview with CBS aired on Sunday.
He said the policy ended up “hurting” him, and he partly blamed “bad messaging” for the Republicans’ losses in the midterms.
When asked about his deportation policy, Trump told CBS’ “60 Minutes,” “I think it was too tough…I think it might be too tough.”
CBS published the excerpt on X before the interview aired on network TV later on Sunday.
It was recorded after the Republican Party suffered a heavy defeat in Tuesday’s midterm elections.
Although Trump has gained some domestic backing for securing the US southern border, his administration’s aggressive effort to deport millions of undocumented migrants has attracted widespread criticism.
Yet on Friday Trump named Stephen Miller, the architect of that hardline policy, as his chief of staff, signaling a bare-knuckle fightback following the Republican election loss.
Miller has become synonymous with scenes of masked immigration agents committing violence after he backed federal agents who shot and killed two Americans earlier this year.
