WASHINGTON – Seeking to pacify frustrated immigration advocates, President Barack Obama is directing the government to find more humane ways to handle deportation for immigrants in the U.S. illegally, the White House said Thursday.

With prospects for an immigration overhaul in Congress appearing ever dimmer, immigration advocates have been ramping up pressure on Obama to halt all deportations – a step Obama has insisted he can’t take by himself. By announcing he’s open to changing how the U.S. enforces its current laws, Obama is signaling he may be growing more inclined to test the limits of his authority in the face of congressional inaction.

Obama’s announcement came Thursday in a meeting with Latino lawmakers who are seeking ways to resuscitate an immigration overhaul despite resistance from Republicans and election-year politics that have confounded their efforts. The White House said Obama told the lawmakers – all Democrats – that he’s deeply concerned about the pain that families suffer when they are separated due to a broken immigration system.

“He told the members that he has asked Secretary of Homeland Security Jeh Johnson to do an inventory of the Department’s current practices to see how it can conduct enforcement more humanely within the confines of the law,” the White House said in a statement.

A White House spokesman declined to answer questions about what the government could do to make deportation more humane or the timeline for Johnson to report back to the president.

But immigration activists will likely call for Obama to halt deportations for parents of children brought to the U.S. illegally, among other steps. Obama has already moved to ease deportations for some of those children, but not their parents.