Trump says deportations may have cost GOP the midterms - then hires Stephen Miller

President Donald Trump said his administration's deportation policy "might have been too tough" and that it was part of the reason Republicans lost control of the House and Senate in the midterm elections. The comment came in an interview with CBS's "60 Minutes" that aired Sunday, November 8, 2026.

Trump said he believes he can work with the new Democratic majority on "some kind of immigration deal." He gave no specifics about what that deal would look like.

He also said the policy hurt Republicans partly because it deported people with "good jobs" who had only committed the crime of crossing illegally.

Shortly after taping the interview on Friday, Trump named Stephen Miller as his new chief of staff, replacing Susie Wiles. Miller is described as the key architect of Trump's hard-line immigration agenda. He took up the role on Monday.

Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer criticized the move on social media Sunday after the interview aired. "Trump says his immigration crackdown went too far," Schumer wrote. "Apparently, his solution was to put the man responsible for it in charge of the White House."

Congress reconvened Monday in a changed Washington. Trump and his Justice Department have taken a combative stance toward Democrats despite the GOP losses.

The sequence leaves open whether the administration will moderate its deportation approach or continue it unchanged. Trump's comment that the policy "might have been too tough" is not a reversal or a formal end to the policy. His simultaneous promotion of Miller, who built that policy, is a signal that any softening may be rhetorical rather than structural.

What specific immigration deal, if any, Trump and the new Democratic majority could agree on is not known. Whether Miller's promotion will lead to a continuation or escalation of hard-line deportation policies is also not known. And it is not established whether voter data specifically confirmed that deportation policy drove Republican losses, or whether Trump's assessment is anecdotal.