CREDIT: US Customs and Border Protection via Flickr.com. Public domain.

A new report from NBC News citing “three U.S. officials with knowledge of meetings at the White House” states that, contrary to many other reports in the wake of the resignation of Homeland Security secretary Kirstjen Nielsen, the outgoing secretary opposed reinstating the policy of separation of migrant families at the border, putting her at odds with the president.

EXCLUSIVE from @JuliaEAinsley and me: President Trump has for months now urged his administration to reinstate large-scale separation of migrant families crossing the border, according to three U.S. officials with knowledge of meetings at the White House. — Geoff Bennett (@GeoffRBennett) April 8, 2019

Kirstjen Nielsen resisted, setting her at odds with the president. According to 2 of the sources, Nielsen told Trump that federal court orders prohibited DHS from reinstating the policy & that he would be reversing his own executive order from June that ended family separation. — Geoff Bennett (@GeoffRBennett) April 8, 2019

Trump has been pushing this policy since January, the sources said. A senior administation official says they believe Trump is convinced that family separation has been the most effective policy at deterring large numbers of asylum seekers. — Geoff Bennett (@GeoffRBennett) April 8, 2019

This, of course, runs counter to almost all other reporting on Nielsen since almost the beginning of her tenure. Some of those headlines include:

A few ladies at The View even suggested Nielsen had “sold her soul” in the service of separating children from their families.

HOSTIN: “What’s fascinating to me is that I believe she sold her soul, because she did become the face of separating babies from their parents. We now know that it’s going to take about two years to even find out the true extent of this horror, you know, because thousands of children were separated from their families.”

There’s some stuff in that clip about homegrown white supremacy as well, if you care to listen. The NBC News report, however, alleges that Nielsen actually attempted to convince her boss that reinstating the family separation policy — which NBC News asserts Trump believes to be an effective deterrent to illegal immigration (but take that with a grain of salt) — ran counter to the law.

According to two of the sources, Nielsen told Trump that federal court orders prohibited the Department of Homeland Security from reinstating the policy, and that he would be reversing his own executive order from June that ended family separations.

Now of course, in light of this new development, the goal posts have shifted and Nielsen was evil, but not evil enough for Trump.

If there’s any justice in this world, she will think twice before traveling overseas for fear of being arrested for crimes against humanity. Her successor will surely be worse.

The rhetoric against a woman who was trying to follow the laws related to the border crisis — at the very least that fact seems to be almost universally accepted now — has been of the type that stokes fear and hatred, is extraordinarily counterproductive, and makes it clear Nielsen was smart to get out when she did. And it’s not a little uncomfortable to realize there’s a growing and mainstream faction of Americans willing to place the blame for families separated at the border entirely at the feet of the nation housing them without once questioning how and why those children ended up at the border to begin with.