The deaths of two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis at the hands of ICE has led to calls from some for lawmakers to block a funding package that includes money for the agency.
Democratic leaders in the U.S. Senate say they will not support a funding bill that includes money for the Department of Homeland Security without a review of ICE’s tactics. That could lead to a partial government shutdown as soon as this weekend.
Mark Jones, a political science professor at Rice University, said regardless of whether there is a partial government shutdown, ICE operations will continue uninterrupted.
“In the big, beautiful bill, which was passed last year, there’s over $75 billion for ICE, meaning that even if there’s a government shutdown, ICE operations will continue unabated,” Jones said.
Still, Democratic lawmakers have said they will not support a funding package for six departments if it includes funding for ICE with no guardrails.
“Really, it’s the big departments that haven’t been funded yet,” Jones said. “We’re talking about the Department of Defense, Homeland Security, Treasury, Transportation, Health and Human Services, and Housing and Urban Development. But the real spotlight is on Homeland Security and ICE in particular, and that’s what’s really caused this breakdown.”
Funding for these six departments was packaged together into one bill by the House of Representatives, Jones said. This means that if the Senate makes any changes, the House will have to come back and approve them.
Some of those changes could look like reducing the number of detention beds and requiring more body camera footage. But Jones said given recent events in Minnesota, some lawmakers feel that will not be enough.
“They’ve decided they really want an overhaul of the entire agency, but they haven’t been specific in terms of details,” he said. “And that’s one of the things that’s bogging down in negotiations, because while they want change, it’s not clear what exact changes they want and what exact changes Republicans are going to agree to. And with the clock ticking with the shutdown starting Saturday morning at 12:01 AM Eastern, there really isn’t much time.”
Some Republican lawmakers have also been critical of ICE’s actions in Minneapolis.
“There have been calls for Kristi Noem, the Secretary of Homeland Security, to resign by some Republicans, and there certainly isn’t much support for her among Republicans in Congress these days,” Jones said.
“But right now, Republicans are sticking with the strategy of passing all six bills together in the package that they’re presently put in, and then negotiating different changes to ICE and Homeland Security with Democrats later on. Democrats’ main response is that they don’t trust the Trump administration to follow through on anything they agreed to.”
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Jones said this government shutdown is related to the deal that got us out of the last government shutdown in the fall — the longest in U.S. history at 43 days.
“Part of the agreement was a continuing resolution that funded the government through Jan. 30,” Jones said. “And so they effectively decided to kick the can down the road and use the few months to come to an agreement. And they actually had come to that agreement. And had it not been for the killing in Minnesota this past weekend, they likely would be voting on this legislation today or tomorrow in the Senate, and we wouldn’t be talking about a shutdown.”
