Then Trump got to the rest of the 12 million, the large majority of the 12 million, who have not committed crimes in the U.S. Here is what Trump said, from the prepared text of his speech:

For those here today illegally who are seeking legal status, they will have one route and only one route: to return home and apply for re-entry under the rules of the new legal immigration system that I have outlined above. Those who have left to seek entry under this new system will not be awarded surplus visas, but will have to enter under the immigration caps or limits that will be established.

We will break the cycle of amnesty and illegal immigration. There will be no amnesty.

Our message to the world will be this: you cannot obtain legal status, or become a citizen of the United States, by illegally entering our country.

This declaration alone will help stop the crisis of illegal crossings and illegal overstays.

People will know that you can’t just smuggle in, hunker down, and wait to be legalized. Those days are over.

In several years, when we have accomplished all of our enforcement goals – and truly ended illegal immigration for good, including the construction of a great wall, and the establishment of our new lawful immigration system – then and only then will we be in a position to consider the appropriate disposition of those who remain. That discussion can only take place in an atmosphere in which illegal immigration is a memory of the past, allowing us to weigh the different options available based on the new circumstances at the time.

What did that mean? First, Trump’s statement that those here illegally would have “one route and only one route” to legal status seems clear. Everybody seeking legalization would have to leave and then return.

But then, a few short paragraphs later, Trump said that “in several years,” when tough enforcement measures are fully in place — not contemplated, not in the planning stage, but actually up and running — then “we will be in a position to consider the appropriate disposition of those who remain.”

Trump was addressing the illegal immigrants who would choose to stay in this country — that is, non-criminals and those who chose not to return to their home countries and get in line to return to the United States. If those people stayed here, Trump said, then their situation would be debated after all the enforcement measures are in effect. At that time, there would be “different options” available for them.

It’s a position that probably seems unfamiliar to those who haven’t followed the intricacies of the immigration debate in Washington for the last many years. But the treatment of the 12 million has always been a sticking point in that debate. Democrats wanted immediate legalization, while many Republicans wanted legalization delayed until after enforcement was in place.

GOP immigration hawks didn’t like to even debate the 12 million question because they wanted to concentrate first on enforcement, in large part because they have seen many phony enforcement promises in the past. The implicit argument of the hawks, though, was this: If enforcement really happens, if it is really in place, then they, the hawks, would not object to some sort of legalization for the 12 million.

Trump outdid them all last year when he called for the deportation of all 12 million. Washington immigration hawks knew that was impractical, and they were also disappointed that Trump got bogged down in the 12 million question when he should have been focusing on enforcement.

Now, though, in his own way, Trump has come around. In Phoenix, he said that those who choose not to leave and return will have their cases debated after enforcement is in place. Trump didn’t say it, but most Republican immigration hawks would interpret that to mean that some sort of legal status would lie in the future for those illegal immigrants who wait for years until enforcement is fully enacted.

It’s a complicated situation, and one can get into the weeds pretty quickly. And the answer is simply not entirely satisfying, at least for those who want some certainty in far-reaching plans. After the speech, Associated Press reporter Erica Werner tweeted, “Trump would deport some people; others would leave to seek legalization. But how many remain, and what of them? Key unanswered question.”

In response, Mark Krikorian, head of the Center for Immigration Studies and a leading immigration hawk, responded: “Unanswerable. We need to put enforcement policies in place & see what situation looks like.”

In the long run, the answer probably doesn’t matter much to Trump’s core supporters. The overwhelming message of the Phoenix speech was that Trump will be strong on immigration, stronger than any president in a very long time. Given all the other proposals in the speech, the details of how Trump will handle the 12 million after a host of groundbreaking new security measures are in place is probably not a deal-breaker for Trump’s supporters.

But that still leaves the question: Why did Trump and his top lieutenants make things so confusing in recent days? After the speech, CNN’s Maeve Reston tweeted, “Given Trump’s tone, I still don’t understand point of allowing softening/hardening debate to rage over past 2 weeks. What was the point?”

Indeed. After all the talk, that is one question about the Trump immigration drama that remains entirely unanswered.