Mullin raised the possibility of Congress considering legal status for DACA recipients — sparking immediate pushback from the conservative base.
DACA — Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals — was introduced by Democrat President Barack Obama in June of 2012.
It’s an immigration policy that provides temporary protection from deportation for certain illegals who were brought to the United States as children.
Obama created DACA through executive-branch authority rather than legislation passed by Congress. Supporters argue that the government should exercise discretion rather than deport people brought here as children who have established lives in America. Critics argue that the executive branch exceeded its authority by effectively creating an immigration program that Congress never authorized.
That distinction—whether a president can establish such a program without congressional approval—is at the heart of the continuing legal battle.
At present, there are more than half a million DACA recipients.
These individuals are often referred to as “Dreamers,” a term associated with legislation known as the DREAM Act, which has never been enacted as law. The Development, Relief and Education for Alien Minors Act (DREAM) would have established a legal pathway to permanent residency and potential citizenship for qualifying residents.
Talking about this on American Family Radio (AFR)'s "Jenna Ellis in the Morning" program, conservative talk radio host Steve Deace sounded the alarm on potential legal status for DACA recipients.
Will GOP alienate its base?
In doing so, Deace broke down what this means for the future of the conservative movement and 2028, pointing directly to the political peril of breaking covenant with the base.
“You're going to be a repeat of 1992 with no new taxes, you break covenant like that with your base, and somebody will run third party on immigration and our heritage. And that person... will get seven, eight, 9%, and it's all going to be millennial men and Gen Z men who thinks that immigration is the No. 1 issue."
However, Deace also offered a strategic counter-theory — suggesting that Mullin’s comments could be a calculated chess move to trap congressional Democrats:
“This is an attempt by the president to bait Democrats into showing they're not going to make any ... reasonable deals. This is to show Democrats really don't care about affordability. It's a chance to essentially entrap them in a corner, and they're going to demonstrate this.”
This could be a White House response to Democrats’ successful “affordability” psyop in the midterms recently exposed and praised by CNN’s Van Jones.
Democrats are “already talking Medicare for All, impeach everybody, the word affordability has barely been brought up since election night and so you put them in a corner to show these are not new democrats, they're the same ones you rejected many many times in the past, and you start planting that seed now of successfully defining them as radicals so that you can then successfully run against that in two years."
Whether it's a high-stakes political trap or a genuine shift in policy, analysts agree the fallout will reverberate all the way to the 2028 election.
