Trump open to letting Dreamers "morph into" citizens

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump said today he's open to an immigration plan that will provide a pathway to citizenship for hundreds of thousands of young people who were brought to the country as children and are now here illegally.

"We're going to morph into it," Trump told reporters. "It's going to happen, at some point in the future, over a period of 10 to 12 years."

His pronouncement came as the White House announced it would be unveiling a legislative framework on immigration next week that it hopes can pass both the House and the Senate.

Trump's remarks amounted to a preview of that framework. He said he'll propose $25 billion for building a wall on the U.S.-Mexico border and $5 billion for other security measures.

Trump told reporters he had a message for the so-called Dreamers, those brought to the country illegally as children: "Tell 'em not to be concerned, OK? Tell 'em not to worry. We're going to solve the problem."

Trump was talking about the young immigrants who had been protected from deportation and given the right to work legally in the country under the Obama-era Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, or DACA. Trump announced he was ending DACA last year, but he has given Congress until March to come up with a legislative fix.

Trump said he was confident a deal can be reached on the issue. White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said the framework to be unveiled Monday "represents a compromise that members of both parties can support."