Trump says deportation push hasn’t put 'same pressure' on farm workers, hotel staff: 'Not even close'

President Donald Trump acknowledged Monday night that his administration's mass deportation agenda has not applied the same pressure to migrant workers in agriculture and hospitality as it has to people he described as murderers and drug dealers. "We certainly haven't put the same push on them as we have on the murderers or the drug dealers," Trump said during a surprise phone call to C-SPAN's Washington Journal. "We haven't put the same pressure on waitresses and on farmworkers, etc. Not even close."

The remarks came in Trump's first interview since Republicans lost majorities in both chambers of Congress in last week's midterm elections. In a "60 Minutes" interview that aired Sunday, Trump told host Ross Douthat that immigration enforcement both helped and hurt Republicans, acknowledging criticism over deportations of people with jobs. "But I get hurt because we also took people that had good jobs," he said.

Trump described the political tension between voters who want all undocumented immigrants deported and those who believe longtime workers should be allowed to stay. "When you go into a hotel and you have a woman that's working there as a maid, as a cleaner... and all of a sudden they're being taken out of the country, it's tough. It's a tough thing," he said, adding that people on the far right want deportations regardless of whether the immigrant is working.

The president also floated the idea of working with Democrats on a deal for immigrants who have lived illegally in the U.S. for more than a decade, saying he would be willing to "work a deal" for people who have been in the country for "10 and 15 years." However, at a White House press briefing earlier Monday, Trump insisted "there won't be amnesty" and his policy "hasn't changed."

During the C-SPAN call, Trump also addressed the potential impeachment of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, saying he would be "disappointed" if Republicans voted for the resolution introduced by Rep. Thomas Massie, R-Ky. On the war with Iran, Trump said "it depends" when it would end, suggesting it could be resolved quickly or over a "short, not a long period of time." He said he believes Iran "would like to make a deal, and we'll find out whether or not that'll happen."