This is bad news for Trump's base and a big political win for Democrats, as the president suggests he may back amnesty after Republicans got crushed in the midterms.

• Trump told CBS his own deportation push "might be too tough" and said he's open to legalizing millions of people here illegally, including those already talking to him about a deal.
• This echoes Reagan's 1986 amnesty, which legalized about 3 million people but was followed by decades of much larger illegal immigration, not less.
• Business lobbyists and some Republican lawmakers are pushing amnesty to keep labor cheap, even though AI is expected to wipe out large numbers of jobs in the next few years, making more low-skilled immigration especially risky.
• Trump has deported fewer people so far in this term than Obama did in his second term, despite running on the most aggressive deportation promises in modern political history.
• Several prominent conservative commentators have stayed largely silent on the amnesty talk while focusing heavily on Middle East issues instead.

Outlook: Watch for a possible Senate deal on legal status for long-term undocumented workers, though the White House is publicly downplaying the shift for now.