Signs executive order ending family separation policy after claiming he couldn't do it by executive order

After weeks of defending his administration's "zero tolerance" policy that separated over 2,800 children from their parents at the border, Trump abruptly reversed course and signed an executive order to end the separations amid intense public outcry and images of children in cages. Just days earlier, on June 15, Trump had falsely claimed "you can't do it through executive order" and blamed Democrats for the policy his own administration created. When signing the order, Trump said "I didn't like the sight or the feeling of families being separated" despite having implemented and defended the policy. The order maintained the zero-tolerance prosecution policy but attempted to detain families together, creating a new crisis of indefinite family detention. The government had no plan to reunite the thousands of children already separated, and a federal judge later ordered reunification within 30 days.

"I didn't like the sight or the feeling of families being separated." — June 20, 2018 statement while signing executive order to end family separations, despite having created and defended the policy