President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump arrive for Easter services at Episcopal Church of Bethesda-by-the-Sea in Palm Beach, Fla., Sunday, April 1, 2018. (AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais) (Associated Press) 
 
 President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump arrive for Easter services at Episcopal Church of Bethesda-by-the-Sea in Palm Beach, Fla., Sunday, April 1, 2018. (AP Photo/Pablo Martinez Monsivais) (Associated Press) 
 
 PALM BEACH, Fla. (AP) — President Donald Trump on Sunday declared "NO MORE" to a deal to help "Dreamer" immigrants and threatened to pull out of a free trade agreement with Mexico unless it does more to stop people from crossing into the U.S. He claimed they're coming to take advantage of protections granted certain immigrants. 
 
 "NO MORE DACA DEAL!" Trump tweeted one hour after he began the day by wishing his followers a "HAPPY EASTER!" 
 
 He said Mexico must "stop the big drug and people flows, or I will stop their cash cow, NAFTA. NEED WALL!" The U.S., Canada and Mexico are participating in tense negotiations over the North American Free Trade Agreement at Trump's insistence. Trump says NAFTA is bad for the U.S. 
 
 "Mexico has got to help us at the border," Trump, holding his wife's hand, told reporters before the couple attended Easter services at an Episcopal church near his Palm Beach, Florida, home. "If they're not going to help us at the border, it's a very sad thing between our two countries." 
 
 "A lot of people are coming in because they want to take advantage of DACA," he added. 
 
 Former President Barack Obama created the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program to provide temporary protection and work permits to hundreds of thousands of immigrants who are living in the U.S. illegally after being brought here as children. Trump ended the program last year, but gave Congress six months to pass legislation enshrining it. A deal has so far proved elusive and Trump has blamed Democrats. 
 
 It was not immediately clear what Trump was referring to when he said people are coming to take advantage of the program. 
 
 The Department of Homeland Security is not issuing new permits, though existing ones can be renewed. The Obama administration allowed sign-ups during a set period of time, and the program is closed to new entrants. 
 
 Proposed DACA deals crafted by lawmakers and rejected by Trump also were not open to new participants. 
 
 Trump did not explain what he meant when questioned by reporters as he entered the Church of Bethesda-by-the-Sea with the first lady and his daughter Tiffany. The White House did not immediately respond to a request for clarification. 
 
 Trump, when addressing reporters briefly before entering the church, again blamed Democrats for failing to protect the "Dreamers." 
 
 "They had a great chance. The Democrats blew it. They had a great, great chance, but we'll have to take a look because Mexico has got to help us at the border. They flow right through Mexico. They send them into the United States. It can't happen that way anymore." 
 
 Trump promised during the 2016 presidential campaign to build a southern border wall to stop illegal immigration and drugs from Mexico, but Congress has frustrated him by not moving as quickly as he wants to provide money for construction. 
 
 The president also complained on Twitter that border patrol agents can't do their jobs properly because of "ridiculous liberal (Democrat) laws" that allow people caught for being in the country illegally to be released while they await a hearing before a federal immigration judge. 
 
 Trump tweeted that the situation is "Getting more dangerous" and "Caravans" are coming. He did not offer details to back his comment. 
 
 The president's tweets came after Fox News' "Fox & Friends" reported early Sunday on what it said is a group of 1,200 immigrants, mostly from Honduras, headed to the U.S. The segment was a follow-up to a report by Buzzfeed News on hundreds of Central Americans making their way through Mexico in hopes that American authorities will grant them asylum or be absent when they attempt to cross the border. 
 
 The Fox headline was "Caravan of illegal immigrants headed to U.S." The president is known to watch the cable TV program in the morning. 
 
 Brandon Judd, leader of the union representing border patrol agents, predicted on "Fox & Friends" that those in the caravan would create havoc and chaos in the U.S. as they wait for what he described as immigration reform. Judd also said Congress needs to pass tougher laws, an idea Trump appeared to echo, and create more bed space for immigration authorities to house people. 
 
 Some fellow Republicans chided Trump over the tone of the tweets. 
 
 "A true leader preserves & offers hope, doesn't take hope from innocent children who call America home. Remember, today is Easter Sunday," tweeted Ohio Gov. John Kasich, a Trump critic who challenged him for the 2016 Republican presidential nomination. 
 
 Sunday's church visit was Trump's first public appearance with his wife since CBS's "60 Minutes" aired an interview the previous Sunday with Stormy Daniels, the adult film star who says she had sex with Trump in 2006, early in his marriage and a few months after the Mrs. Trump had given birth to their son. The White House says Trump denies the affair. Mrs. Trump spent most of the past week in Palm Beach with her son. 
 
 The Trumps were returning to Washington later Sunday. 
 
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 Associated Press writer Kevin Freking in Washington contributed to this report. 
 
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 Follow Darlene Superville on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/dsupervilleap ||||| President Donald Trump railed against immigrants, Mexico, and Democrats in a series of tweets on Sunday and Monday that suggested a caravan of immigrants reportedly traveling toward the U.S. are trying to take advantage of a program they would not qualify for. 
 
 At the White House Easter Egg roll on Monday, Trump told reporters: “The Democrats have really let them down. They really let them down. It’s a shame. A lot of people have taken advantage of DACA. It’s a shame,” according to a pool report. 
 
 Trump’s statements appear to have come after Fox News reported on a caravan of over 1,000 Central American migrants that is currently traveling through Mexico. The migrants’ trek was first reported by BuzzFeed News. 
 
 The 2018 caravan is being organized by a humanitarian volunteer group called Pueblos Sin Fronteras, or People Without Borders. The group organized two similar caravans in 2017 and has aided migrants and refugees on the move for over 15 years, according to its website. The group hopes that by traveling in such a large group they will be able to avoid some of the dangers that befell travelers who take the often perilous route through Mexico to the southern border of the United States. 
 
 Alex Mensing of Pueblos Sin Fronteras told ABC News that many of the caravan travelers are fleeing violence and that they are hoping to reach U.S. ports of entry in Arizona, California, or New Mexico where they will claim asylum and likely be detained. 
 
 But starting on Sunday morning, Trump unleashed a flurry of tweets about the caravans – and seemed to conflate the group with DACA. Here are the facts. 
 
 Trump blames “Catch & Release” 
 
 Trump first tweeted that “caravans” are heading toward the Southern U.S. border, but patrol agents “are not allowed to properly do their jobs.” Trump blamed that inability to work on “ridiculous liberal (Democrat) laws like Catch & Release.” 
 
 The majority of migrants traveling in the 2018 caravan are originally from Honduras, according to BuzzFeed, and many are fleeing the political unrest that followed the 2017 elections there. Some two-thirds of the migrants reportedly hoping to seek asylum when they reach the U.S. 
 
 During an appearance on Fox and Friends, the union chief of the National Border Patrol Council, Brandon Judd, suggested the “catch and release” policy was partly to blame. Under the policy, unlawful immigrants are released from detention while they await hearings in immigration court. Judd also said that immigrants can also be released if they claim asylum. 
 
 “Once they enter the country, even if we are standing at the border with our hands out saying, ‘Don’t enter, don’t enter,’ all they have to do is cross one foot into the border and we have to take them into custody,” he said. “If they ask for asylum or say I fear to go back to my country, then we have to process them under ‘credible fear’ which allows them to be released into our country.” 
 
 In a February 2017 memo, then Department of Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly said the administration was ending “catch and release,” but a Reuters report from last June showed that it was easier said than done. 
 
 The Trump Administration’s attempt to end “Catch & Release” has been hampered by the reality that immigration authorities don’t have the space to hold every immigrant who is detained at the border, according to Reuters. 
 
 Mexico denies it “is doing very little” to stop illegal immigration 
 
 In tweets on Monday Trump blamed Mexico for allowing people to travel to the U.S., suggesting he would end the North American Free Trade Agreement in an effort to stem the flow of migrants. 
 
 The BuzzFeed report notes that “no one has made any effort to stop” the migrants as they travel through Mexico without authorization. About one third of the migrants traveling plan to stay in the country rather than continue on to the U.S. 
 
 Luis Videgaray Caso, Mexico’s Secretary of Foreign Affairs, responded in a tweet on Sunday, saying that Mexican authorities work with their American counterparts on migration “every day.” 
 
 Caravan of immigrants not eligible for DACA 
 
 In his tweets, Trump also declared the end of a deal on DACA, a program that has protected young immigrants who were brought to the U.S. by their parents from deportation. Trump suggested that the immigrants who made up the caravan were coming to America in hopes of taking advantage of the program, which he effectively ended in September 2017. Efforts to offer DACA recipients permanent protections have stymied in Congress, in part due the to strict provisions Trump wants included in any deal. Trump has tried to shift the blame to Democrats, but it is not that simple. 
 
 It should be noted that the migrants who are traveling in the caravan, no matter their age, would not qualify for DACA. 
 
 The Trump administration stopped accepting new applications for the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, or DACA, on Sept. 5, 2017. Under the president’s orders, renewal applications for people who already benefitted from the program needed to have been turned in by Oct. 5, 2017. 
 
 Legal challenges have kept the program alive, to an extent. The administration is still not accepting new applications, but people who have already benefitted from the program can reapply. According to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, all renewal requests will be adjudicated under the guidelines that were set forth when the program was first established. ||||| US president Donald Trump tweeted at length about immigration today, following up on yesterday’s references to “caravans” of people heading toward the US border with Mexico. 
 
 Border Patrol Agents are not allowed to properly do their job at the Border because of ridiculous liberal (Democrat) laws like Catch & Release. Getting more dangerous. “Caravans” coming. Republicans must go to Nuclear Option to pass tough laws NOW. NO MORE DACA DEAL! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 1, 2018 
 
 Mexico has the absolute power not to let these large “Caravans” of people enter their country. They must stop them at their Northern Border, which they can do because their border laws work, not allow them to pass through into our country, which has no effective border laws….. — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 2, 2018 
 
 There is little connection between the approaching “caravan” and the US program Deferred Action for Childhood Arrival (DACA) cited by the US president. DACA only applies to immigrants who entered the US illegally as minors more then 10 years ago. 
 
 The caravan is a group of Central American men, women and children. They number up to 1,000, according to organizers, and are currently traveling through Mexico with the goal of eventually crossing into the US. 
 
 Their hope, as Buzzfeed’s Adolfo Flores reports, is that strength in numbers will protect them from the violent cartels that migrants sometimes encounter on the journey north, as well present a logistical challenge for immigration authorities hoping to turn them away. 
 
 Hundreds of Central American migrants attend a mass in Tapachula, Mexico on March 25, 2018. (Reuters/Jose Torres) 
 
 Hundreds of Central American migrants attend a mass on March 25, 2018. (Reuters/Jose Torres) 
 
 Hundreds of Central American migrants take part in a Via Crucis on Palm Sunday from Tapachula, Mexico on March 25, 2018. Their banner reads “We are all America no to the discrimination.” (Reuters/Jose Torres) 
 
 Central American migrants arrive at in Ixtepec, Oaxaca, Mexico, before continuing their journey to the US on March 30. (Reuters/Jose Jesus Cortes) 
 
 Central American migrants gather before continuing their journey to the US in Ixtepec, Oaxaca, Mexico March 30, 2018. (Reuters/Jose Jesus Cortes) 
 
 Central American migrants gather before continuing their journey to the US (Reuters/Jose Jesus Cortes) 
 
 Central American migrants gather before continuing their journey to the US on March 31. (Reuters/Jose Jesus Cortes) 
 
 Central American migrants gather in Ixtepec, Oaxaca on March 31, 2018. (Reuters/Jose Jesus Cortes) 
 
 Central American migrants rest in Ixtepec, Oaxaca on March 31. (Reuters/Jose Jesus Cortes) ||||| Democratic leaders announced late Wednesday that they agreed with President Trump to pursue a legislative deal that would protect hundreds of thousands of young undocumented immigrants from deportation and enact border security measures that don’t include building a physical wall. 
 
 The president discussed options during a dinner at the White House with Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) that also included talks on tax reform, infrastructure and trade. Trump has showed signs of shifting strategy to cross the aisle and work with Democrats in the wake of the high-profile failures by Republicans to repeal the Affordable Care Act. 
 
 “We’re working on a plan for DACA,” Trump said as he left the White House on Thursday for a trip to survey hurricane damage in Florida. 
 
 Trump said that he and Congress are “fairly close” to a deal and that Republican leaders Rep. Paul Ryan (Wis.) and Sen. Mitch McConnell (Ky.) are “very much on board” with a deal that would address DACA. The agreement must include “massive border security,” Trump said in response to shouted questions about whether he had reached a deal on the terms Schumer and Pelosi had described. 
 
 “The wall will come later” he said, apparently confirming a central element of the Democrats’ account. 
 
 Earlier Thursday, amid backlash from conservative supporters, Trump had sought Thursday to reach out to his GOP base with messages claiming his agenda would remain intact on signature issues such as the border wall. 
 
 In a series of tweets, Trump wrote that “no deal” was made on the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, an Obama-era program that has allowed 690,000 dreamers to work and go to school without fear of deportation. He further wrote that agreements on “massive border security” would have to accompany any new DACA provisions, and insisted that “the WALL will continue to be built.” 
 
 But he again put lawmakers on notice that he favors some protections for the so-called “dreamers.” 
 
 “Does anybody really want to throw out good, educated and accomplished young people who have jobs, some serving in the military?” Trump wrote in back-to-back tweets. Really! … They have been in our country for many years through no fault of their own — brought in by parents at young age. Plus BIG border security.” 
 
 The WALL, which is already under construction in the form of new renovation of old and existing fences and walls, will continue to be built. — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 14, 2017 
 
 A possible alliance between Trump and the Democrats on immigration would represent a major political gamble for a president who made promises of tougher border control policies the centerpiece of his campaign and pledged to build a “big, beautiful wall” along the U.S.-Mexico border. A majority of Republicans, especially in the House, have long opposed offering legal status, and a path to citizenship, to the nation’s more than 11 million undocumented immigrants. 
 
 In a sign of the potential trouble for the president, Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa), an immigration hard-liner and early Trump supporter, wrote that if reports of a potential immigration deal are accurate, the president’s “base is blown up, destroyed, irreparable, and disillusioned beyond repair. No promise is credible.” 
 
 
 
 President Trump meets Sept. 6 with Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) and other congressional leaders in the Oval Office of the White House. (Evan Vucci/AP) 
 
 Trump has vacillated over the fate of the dreamers, who have lived in the country illegally since they were children. Under mounting pressure from the right, Trump moved two weeks ago to begin dismantling the program. 
 
 In announcing the decision, the president made clear that he expected Congress to pursue a plan to protect the DACA recipients, offering a six-month delay until their two-year work permits begin to expire in March. 
 
 In a statement, the White House described the meeting as “constructive” and said the administration “looks forward to continuing these conversations with leadership on both sides of the aisle.” 
 
 A similar positive readout was given by Schumer, who said Thursday that he expected White House to “support enshrining the DACA protections into law.” 
 
 “What remains to be negotiated are the details of border security with a mutual goal of finalizing all the details as soon as possible,” Schumer said during a Senate floor speech. “While both sides agreed that the wall would not be part of this agreement, the president made clear he intends to pursue it at a later time and we made clear that we will continue to oppose it.” 
 
 “Details will matter, but it was a very, very positive step” to have Trump agree to seek legal protections for “dreamers.” 
 
 Schumer noted that lawmakers have in the past supported a bipartisan plan to spend billions of dollars on border security technology to track illegal border crossings and to hire more U.S. Border Patrol agents. 
 
 He dismissed talk of a border wall as “A ‘Game of Thrones’ idea for a world that is closer to ‘Star Wars.’” 
 
 Congressional aides familiar with the exchange said that Trump and the party leaders agreed to move quickly on legislation to protect dreamers, though aides did not disclose whether they agreed that the goal should be for dreamers to eventually be offered a path to citizenship. 
 
 In a statement, Schumer and Pelosi said they had “a very productive meeting at the White House with the President. The discussion focused on DACA. We agreed to enshrine the protections of DACA into law quickly, and to work out a package of border security, excluding the wall, that’s acceptable to both sides.” 
 
 In a letter to her Democratic colleagues in the House, Pelosi said she hoped the deal could be done “in a matter of weeks.” 
 
 White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders confirmed that DACA and border security were discussed, but she said excluding border wall funding from a package deal was “certainly not agreed to.” 
 
 While DACA and border security were both discussed, excluding the wall was certainly not agreed to. — Sarah Sanders (@PressSec) September 14, 2017 
 
 Earlier in the day, Trump held a bipartisan meeting with a group of House members. Afterward, several Democrats involved in those talks said the president also had made clear that he did not expect border wall funding to be included in a legislative deal on the dreamers. They said Trump was not giving up on the wall but that he emphasized the money could be added to another bill, though he was not specific. 
 
 “He said, the wall doesn’t have to be necessary,” Rep. Henry Cuellar (D-Tex.) told reporters at the White House. “He said we’re going to add [wall funding] somewhere else. … We’ve told him we don’t want to tie this [together]. He said, ‘DACA, we’re going to do it early. We’re going to do some kind of border security.’ He brought up the wall. He said that doesn’t have to be on this DACA bill.” 
 
 Democrats, and some Republicans, have resisted funding for a wall, saying such a structure is not worth the billions of dollars it would cost. 
 
 Breitbart, the conservative news outlet headed by former Trump adviser Stephen K. Bannon, called reports of an immigration deal a “full-fledged cave” by Trump on “amnesty” for the dreamers. 
 
 Sens. Richard Durbin (D-Ill.) and Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.) have introduced legislation, called the Dream Act, that would offer dreamers a path to citizenship. The number of undocumented immigrants that would potentially be covered by that bill, however, is expected to be far larger than the number of those who have DACA protections, a prospect that would probably engender more Republican opposition. 
 
 Cuellar said that he told Trump the Dream Act has sufficient bipartisan support to pass and that the White House should be pushing for a vote. Trump, Cuellar said, told the group: “Oh, it will be on the floor.” 
 
 But Trump also instructed Democrats to consider tougher restrictions on legal immigration, including provisions of a bill called the Raise Act, introduced by Republican Sens. Tom Cotton (Ark.) and David Perdue (Ga.), which would slash legal immigration levels by half over the coming decade. Immigrant rights groups are strongly opposed to such measures, but Trump endorsed that legislation during an appearance with the GOP senators at the White House last month. 
 
 And Republican leaders are already wary of the spending agreement Trump brokered with Democrats last week on a three-month spending plan to raise the debt ceiling and keep the government funded. 
 
 Pelosi and Ryan met earlier Wednesday to begin discussing the broad parameters of the forthcoming immigration debate. Ryan’s team signaled that despite the administration’s eagerness to quickly seal the deal, it will take awhile. 
 
 AshLee Strong, Ryan’s spokeswoman, said that regarding the plight of the dreamers, the speaker “reiterated that any solution needs to address border security and enforcement, which are the root causes of the problem. Discussions among the Republican conference will continue in the coming weeks.” 
 
 Ryan is already facing growing pressure from House conservatives who have begun to question his leadership and have even floated names of possible replacement as speaker. An agreement between Trump and Democrats on a bill to protect dreamers could potentially put Ryan in the position of having to decide whether to bring it for a vote with the prospects that it might pass with more Democratic support than among the GOP. 
 
 Brian Murphy and Anne Gearan contributed to this report.
– President Trump unleashed a Twitter attack on Mexico over the weekend, and he picked up right where he left off on Monday morning. In multiple tweets, Trump said Mexico must do more to stop "caravans of people" heading into the US, blasted Democrats for weak border laws, and again demanded his wall. In regard to those "caravans," a reference to reports about a large group of Central Americans working their way northward through Mexico: "They must stop them at their Northern Border, which they can do because their border laws work, not allow them to pass through into our country, which has no effective border laws," Trump wrote. The president made a point to include Democrats in the blame game. "Congress must immediately pass Border Legislation, use Nuclear Option if necessary, to stop the massive inflow of Drugs and People," he wrote. "Border Patrol Agents (and ICE) are GREAT, but the weak Dem laws don’t allow them to do their job. Act now Congress, our country is being stolen!" He again brought up the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program and reiterated that he was through trying to resurrect it. "DACA is dead because the Democrats didn’t care or act, and now everyone wants to get onto the DACA bandwagon," he wrote. "No longer works. Must build Wall and secure our borders with proper Border legislation. Democrats want No Borders, hence drugs and crime!"