House Speaker Mike Johnson and Senate Republican leader John Thune said Republicans would pursue a two-track strategy to fully fund the Department of Homeland Security, days after Johnson had dismissed a Senate-passed stopgap bill as “a joke.”
The plan called for the House to move the Senate-approved measure that funds most of DHS now, excluding U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) and then use budget reconciliation to fund those enforcement agencies over the coming weeks or months, according to a joint statement from Johnson and Thune posted on X Wednesday.
The development came as DHS continued operating in a partial shutdown that began in mid-February and snarled airport security, with President Donald Trump separately signing a memo to pay Transportation Security Administration (TSA) employees amid the standoff.
ICE is just funded. Because the “power of the purse” was always fake.
Pretty sure the OBBB republicans passed last summer gave them an entire $70 billion to spend outside of their annual budget…
Yeah, ICE has still been operating without any hiccups this whole time due to extra funding from Trumps Big Bill. Forcing the republicans to cave on the two track approach means opening up TSA/etc. while still hamstringing ice and CBP. Maybe not as much as we’d want, but for Republicans to struggle so hard with the majority they have reinforces the unpopulairty of these agencies.