President Trump said confronting undocumented immigrants with “machine guns ready to fire” would be an effective deterrent, but added “I wouldn’t want to do that.”

“They are pouring in. We’re capturing these people, we’re getting ’em,” Trump told Fox News host Sean Hannity during a wide-ranging 45-minute telephone interview on Wednesday night. “But we don’t do like other countries. Other countries stand there with machine guns ready to fire.”

It’s unclear which countries Trump was referring to. Hannity did not ask the president to elaborate.

“We can’t do that and I wouldn’t want to do that,” the president said. “We can’t do it.”

Still, he conceded, “it’s a very effective way of doing it.”

President Trump speaks to reporters in the Oval Office on Wednesday. (Photo: Susan Walsh/AP)

In the same interview, the president called special counsel Robert Mueller’s just-concluded investigation into the Trump campaign’s contacts with Russia “treasonous.” He also called for the resignation of Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., the chair of the House Judiciary Committee, mocked the so-called Green New Deal and said he hoped Fox News’ Jeanine Pirro, who’s been off the air since making Islamophobic comments about Muslim Democratic Rep. Ilhan Omar, will return soon.

In a Thursday morning tweet, Trump accused Mexico of not helping the United States stem the tide of illegal immigration. He also repeated a threat to close the U.S. southern border.

“Mexico is doing NOTHING to help stop the flow of illegal immigrants to our Country,” Trump tweeted. “They are all talk and no action. Likewise, Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador have taken our money for years, and do Nothing. The Dems don’t care, such BAD laws. May close the Southern Border!”

Last month, Trump declared a national emergency to build a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border. Congress passed a resolution to nullify the declaration, but Trump vetoed it, and an effort to override the veto failed.

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