Trump wants to use family separations as 'leverage' to make Democrats negotiate with him: CNN's Jim Acosta

On Monday, President Donald Trump continued his crackdown at the Department of Homeland Security, following up his dismissal of Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen with the firing of Secret Service director Randolph "Tex" Alles.

There are signs he is about to double down on the administration's most infamous border policies, like family separations.

As CNN reporter Jim Acosta told Wolf Blitzer on "The Situation Room," all of this may have a chillingly cynical goal: forcing Democrats in Washington to capitulate to his policy demands.

"Getting back to this notion that the president wants to bring back family separations down at the border," said Acosta. "Yes, he wants to do it as a deterrent, but a Trump campaign adviser just told me a few moments ago that one of the other reasons why the president wants to do it is to have leverage with Democrats when it comes to this debate over immigration, so the president apparently wants to get back to this practice of taking children away from their parents to have leverage on Capitol Hill."

Watch below: