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It makes no sense to hang Ms. Nielsen or others because judges--most appointed by Barack Obama--have erected legal barriers to implementing a rational border policy. The dismissals send the message to the public that the problems at the border can be fixed with better administrative policies or execution.

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Mr. Trump has cause to be exasperated that Congress has ignored him. Yet some of his advisers, especially immigration Svengali Stephen Miller, have also repeatedly scuttled attempts to forge a compromise with Democrats that could provide more legal immigration including work permits for young adults who came to the country as children.

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Mr. Trump needs to offer an immigration policy that gets beyond the political dead end of Mr. Miller's close-the-border restrictionism. Democrats have no incentive to cooperate as long as Mr. Trump is raging against his own deputies as if they're the problem.

The President needs to offer a larger immigration vision that combines border security while welcoming legal immigrants and offering Democrats something they want. If they still refuse to cooperate, then he can offer that better vision to voters in 2020. Until he does he'll be frustrated by his own policy incoherence that sounds tough but accomplishes nothing.