Senate Republicans race to fund ICE, CBP without Democrats as shutdown drags on
Senate Republicans are pushing to fund immigration enforcement through reconciliation by June, bypassing Democrats amid an ongoing DHS shutdown battle.
Senate Republicans are moving to fast-track funding for immigration enforcement without any Democratic support as a partial Department of Homeland Security (DHS) shutdown stretches into its second month.
The upper chamber returns to Washington, D.C., on Monday, and the GOP already has its plan in motion to bypass Democrats’ blockade of funding for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Protection (CBP).
With President Donald Trump's blessing, they are using the budget reconciliation process to front-load funding for immigration enforcement for the remainder of his presidency. Taking that route doesn’t require any Democratic votes, but Republicans will have to put aside any differences they have if they want the legislation to work.
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Senate Majority Whip John Barrasso, R-Wyo., and Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., who chairs the committee that will launch the reconciliation process in the Senate, met with Trump on Friday to lay the groundwork for the package.
Trump said on Truth Social shortly afterward, "Reconciliation is ON TRACK, and we are moving FAST and FOCUSED."
"Radical Left Democrats like Cryin’ Chuck Schumer, and Hakeem ‘High-Tax’ Jeffries, will do their best to stop us, but we don’t need their votes on this Bill, as long as Republicans UNIFY, and stick together," the president said.
"I am calling for the Bill to be done no later than June 1st, and on my desk," he continued. "The Department cannot wait any longer for full funding. We must beat the Radical Left Democrats at their own game."
Trump’s push for a focused package is what Senate Republicans had been hoping for, given that several other items, like the Safeguarding American Voter Eligibility (SAVE) America Act, making their way into the bill could slow down work or get nixed by the rules that reinforce the process.
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"The reconciliation train is on the tracks," Graham said on "Special Report." "We're gonna have a very specific bill coming out before June 1 that will fund the Border Patrol and ICE for the entire presidency, the three years left of President Trump."
Keeping both chambers in alignment will be key, too, given that reconciliation will officially start in the House.
The whole reason Republicans are coalescing behind a reconciliation strategy is because of the ongoing DHS shutdown. The Senate, before leaving Washington for a two-week break, again passed a funding bill that carves out spending for ICE and parts of CBP.
It remains unclear when the House, which returns on Tuesday, will vote on the Senate-passed DHS funding bill.
House Republicans are frustrated that, after passing their own 60-day extension to reopen the agency, they again have to consider the Senate bill.
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Many in the conference want to see the Senate make actual progress on a reconciliation bill before voting to fund DHS, while others on House Speaker Mike Johnson’s, R-La., right flank would rather fund the entirety of Homeland Security through reconciliation.
And a source familiar told Fox News Digital that House GOP leadership is waiting to see the upper chamber take concrete steps on a reconciliation package funding ICE and the Border Patrol before holding a lower chamber vote on the Senate bill.
Resistance in the House would guarantee that the partial shutdown, which hit 58 days on Monday, will continue.
Barrasso urged Johnson to pass the bill quickly to fund the rest of DHS, including the Transportation Security Administration (TSA), Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and others.
"I would recommend that the speaker of the House take it up and pass it as soon as possible," Barrasso said on "The Faulkner Focus."
Meanwhile, he noted that Senate Republicans have already been working on their budget resolution, which will kick off the reconciliation process in the upper chamber, for the last two weeks, and blasted Democrats for spending weeks blocking DHS funding.
"It's critical to get FEMA up again," Barrasso said. "The Coast Guard, cybersecurity, all those things are necessary. The Democrats are against the security of this homeland, and it is just wrong, and we're gonna put an end to it using reconciliation."
Fox News Digital's Adam Pack contributed to this report.
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