President Donald Trump has urged Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin to engage with Democrats who have approached him about immigration reform, Mullin said Monday. The administration has not discussed changing its enforcement policies, however, and remains opposed to amnesty.
Speaking to reporters at a counter-drone conference in Maryland, Mullin said several Democrats had contacted him about working on immigration legislation in the new Congress. He said he had informed Trump, who encouraged him to begin discussions and suggested they meet later.
Mullin said he and Trump had not talked about changing immigration enforcement policy. “We’re never going to allow amnesty to happen,” he added.
Still, Mullin said Congress could consider a route to permanent legal status for people covered by the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program. DACA provides eligible immigrants brought to the United States as children with temporary protection from deportation and authorization to work.
Any proposal allowing DACA recipients to pursue permanent status would be up to Congress, Mullin said.
His remarks follow Trump’s recent indication that he may be open to working with Democrats on immigration after the 2026 midterm elections. Trump has also appointed Stephen Miller, a key architect of his administration’s restrictive immigration policies, as White House chief of staff, replacing Susie Wiles.
Mullin’s comments suggest a more open stance toward DACA than the department expressed earlier this year. In a March post on X, the Department of Homeland Security said DACA does not provide legal status and warned that recipients could be arrested and deported, including in cases involving criminal conduct.
The post included video of Sen. Dick Durbin, an Illinois Democrat, questioning then-DHS Secretary Kristi Noem about background checks for DACA recipients. Noem said the department follows the law when making detention and deportation decisions.
DHS said in the post that Immigration and Customs Enforcement had arrested 264 DACA recipients nationwide between Jan. 20 and Sept. 28, 2025, and that more than 92% had been charged with or convicted of a crime in the United States. Mullin’s remarks Monday were his first public suggestion that Congress could create a path to permanent legal status for DACA recipients.
DHS had not responded to a request for comment by publication time.
