NBC online says Trump signed an executive order today allowing immigrant families to remain together in detention. Why aren’t I jumping for joy? (You can’t see me, but I’m not.) More on that shortly.

Last night’s special reports including the following wrenching items:

• Border guards lined up shoulder-to-shoulder to prevent asylum seekers from taking the single step onto US soil required in order to claim asylum.
• Families sleeping on bridges outside ports of entry for days, waiting for a chance to be processed.
• Families clustered in not-so-safe safe houses in Reynosa, possibly the most dangerous city in the most violent country in the world, like chickens, with the cartel foxes circling for victims to shake down.
• Adults who have already been deported, sans children, and the desperate efforts of their advocates in the US to find those children. No reunions were reported.
• Three facilities for housing those of “tender age”, mostly babies and toddlers, with a fourth proposed, together with a multiple help-wanted ads for baby-minders.
• A cluster of un-air-conditioned tents in the desert near El Paso erected to house the overflow of older children; the temperature there yesterday was 105 degrees F.
• A recording of small children crying for their parents.
• An interview with a woman who agreed to be fast-tracked for deportation in order to accelerate her reunion with her 7-year-old, later realized she would be going alone, and is now struggling to stay in the US until he is found. Two agents peeled him, screaming, out of her arms, after she was jailed.

It also included the following encouraging things:

• Multiple demonstrations large and small. Lots of people carry signs and chant. Some hold signs silently. Some shout encouragement of the You are not alone! variety as the busloads of children leave for detention centers.
• Four moms in Columbus arrested for criminal trespass as they sat in the waiting room of Sen. Portman for more than three hours, hoping to persuade him to take action.
• Several governors, both Democrat and Republican, refusing to send national guard troops to the border to support enforcement of the zero tolerance policy.
• Multiple lawsuits opposing the policy filed or planned.
• All living First Ladies, including the current one, condemning the policy publicly. Melania may, in fact, deserve a lot of credit for the policy change signed today.
• Multiple bills filed in the US Congress, all seeking to end the policy of separating families, some including wider immigrant-related legislation.

Yesterday we also heard that the Trump Administration was enjoying the hoopla and would hold out in expectation of forcing draconian immigration laws to be passed. This turned out to be untrue. The executive order is far from capitulation, though:

• It reinforces zero tolerance for crossings outside ports of entry, which it will presumably continue to operate as agent-blocked choke points.
• It advocates “detaining alien families together where appropriate and consistent with law and available resources.” Who decides?
• It reminds us that “Congress’s failure to act and court orders have put the Administration in the position of separating alien families to effectively enforce the law.” False.
• It charges the Secretary of Defense as well as “heads of executive departments and agencies” to provide to the Secretary of Homeland Security “any facilities that are appropriate for such purposes.” Are tents appropriate? Warehouses? Cages?
• It proposes, subject to “availability of appropriations,” to “maintain custody of alien families during the pendency of any criminal improper entry or immigration proceedings involving their members.” Refugee family internment on US soil for years?
• The Secretary of Defense is additionally tasked to “construct such facilities if necessary and consistent with law.” Building internment camps for families!

I say this moment of American Exceptionalism is not quite over.

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Postscript: California’s highly-creative lame-duck governor, Jerry Brown, sent 400 national guard troops to the border specifically tasked not to enforce immigration laws, separate families, or build new border barriers. They are able to combat drug gangs, human traffickers, and drug or gun smugglers. Word is Trump wants the California national guard to go home.