OK, so now what?
It’s Day 40 of the Department of Homeland Security shutdown. The Senate remains at a crippling impasse over a Republican proposal to fund all of DHS except for ICE enforcement.
Senate Democrats argue this proposed framework doesn’t do nearly enough to rein in President Donald Trump’s harsh immigration crackdown, which has included other DHS elements such as CBP and Homeland Security Investigations.
Trump has been no help here, as he has publicly declined to back the Senate GOP proposal.
“Donald Trump is all over the place seemingly without a clue of what’s going on,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said. “And they’re still… afraid of what he might do.”
But Democrats are little better. Their latest counteroffer included some demands that the White House was previously open to. Yet it also reprised others that GOP leaders have already ruled out.
“They didn’t just move the goalposts. They tossed them out of the stadium,” Sen. Steve Daines (R-Mont.) said of Democrats.
So how does Congress get out of this mess? Let’s go over a few possible scenarios.
Thune, Schumer cut a deal. One of the Democrats’ biggest sticking points with the current framework is that CBP and HSI would be fully funded, and there wouldn’t be restrictions on the Trump administration using those agencies for immigration enforcement.
Resolving this could clear the path to a deal. Senate Majority Leader John Thune said “there’s some room” to negotiate, and senators were discussing the issue on the Senate floor on Wednesday.
Several Senate Democrats have indicated that modest changes to the framework proposal could win their support.
“I would vote for a bill that funded CBP but saved ICE for a longer-term discussion,” Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.) told us. “I don’t want to chop ICE in parts and fund one part and not the other because I think dollars are fungible.”
But there are lots of Senate Democrats who won’t vote for anything that funds DHS, especially ICE. Across the aisle, there are conservatives who’ve all but ruled out voting for something that doesn’t fully fund ICE.
Plus, any Senate deal would also need to pass the House. Several House Democrats told us that they can’t vote for a deal that funds CBP. But Speaker Mike Johnson could probably put a Senate-passed bill on the floor and garner a healthy majority of members from both parties.
Picking off the mods. Eventually, the pressure of TSA-related airport chaos could push just enough Senate Democrats to fold. We’re watching eight to 12 Senate Democrats who are retiring or lean more moderate. This group has supported shutdown-ending deals in the past.
If the White House and Thune think they can’t get a deal with Senate Democratic leaders, they could incorporate some proposals that appeal to rank-and-file Democrats into legislative text and see if any moderates bite.
We’ll note a trio of House Democratic moderates met Wednesday with Sen. Katie Britt (R-Ala.), the lead GOP negotiator on DHS. There’s plenty of angst among House Democrats as well, although the “Defund ICE” faction is very vocal and can’t be ignored.
No deal. This situation seems entirely unsustainable at the moment, especially with the crisis unfolding at U.S. airports. Senators also badly want to leave town for a scheduled two-week recess.
Yet it’s possible this stalemate could continue to drag on. Thune could keep forcing procedural votes on DHS funding in order to up the pressure on Democrats, as he’s doing again later today.
Democratic leaders have boxed themselves in by publicly releasing the 10 changes to ICE that they were seeking. How can top Democrats — especially Schumer — back off on those now?
And the White House isn’t doing itself any favors with Democrats as it sends ICE agents to more than a dozen airports across the country. Plus, Trump, distracted by the Iran war, is nowhere to be found in this fight even as Republicans insist he’s behind this framework. How could Democrats do a deal with Trump under these conditions?
Reconciliation news. House Ways and Means Committee Chair Jason Smith (R-Mo.) told attendees at a fundraiser Tuesday night for Rep. Ron Estes (R-Kan.) that if Republicans put together a reconciliation bill, it will include tax policies, according to multiple sources familiar with the remarks.
Smith was reiterating that he doesn’t think a second reconciliation bill is realistic for the GOP. But Smith added that if Republicans are going to pursue reconciliation, taxes could help unify the party.
Ways and Means included a ton of tax cuts and some tax hikes in the One Big Beautiful Bill, so it would be harder to find unifying provisions in the second go-around. But the GOP would need items to rally around with an incredibly thin House margin.
