2 hours ago
7
Democrats in the US Senate have blocked a funding package for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) amid ongoing fury over the Trump administration’s crackdown and the deaths of two people in Minneapolis.
Thursday’s vote means that the department is almost certain to shut down at midnight on Friday evening, affecting a range of services yet largely leaving the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency (ICE) – the target of Democrats’ ire – unaffected because it is already the recipient of lavish federal funding.
While senators voted virtually along party lines, 52-47, in favor of a bill passed by the House of Representatives last month to continue funding the DHS, it fell short of the 60 votes needed to overcome a filibuster.
The vote came hours after Tom Homan, the Trump administration’s “border czar”, announced that ICE was largely withdrawing its operation in Minneapolis, where feelings continue to run high following the shooting deaths last month of two US citizens, Renee Good and Alex Pretti, at the hands of federal agents.
Democrats maintained their opposition after the White House refused to bow to their demands for major reforms in how ICE is run.
Proposed changes included agents wearing identification and body cameras and being barred from operating near schools, medical facilities, churches, polling stations, childcare facilities and courts.
Democrats also demanded that local and state law enforcement agencies be guaranteed the right to handle investigations into potential crimes committed by federal authorities, including excessive use of force.
Republicans have supported the idea of body cameras but have balked at other suggestions, which they say would tie agents’ hands.
In a news conference on Thursday, Chuck Schumer, the Democratic leader in the Senate, said the party wanted “commonsense” changes in how ICE operates.
“From day one, I’ve said unless there were really strong, meaningful reforms to rein in ICE and stop the violence, there will not be Democratic votes to fund ICE and extend the awful status quo that now exists,” he said.
“For weeks, we’ve been pushing commonsense reforms, the very types of things that local police and sheriffs throughout America routinely follow. Today’s strong vote was a shot across the bow to Republicans. Democrats will not support a blank check for chaos.”
The vote will be unlikely to impede ICE’s operations, or those of Customs and Border Protection (CPB), since the agencies received $75bn from Congress last year in Donald Trump’s flagship “big beautiful bill”.
Instead, it will lead to the partial shutdown of agencies like the Transportation Safety Administration (TSA), the Federal Emergency Management Agency (Fema) and the US Coast Guard.
At a meeting of the Senate’s homeland security committee on Thursday, James Lankford, a Republican from Oklahoma, said Democrats’ reaction to the killing of Pretti in particular would have a disproportionate effect.
“My Democratic colleagues are demanding to defund all of DHS, including the coast guard, the Secret Service, Fema, CISA [the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency] that handles our cybersecurity … because they’re angry about this incident that is under investigation,” he said.
“I understand these are hard issues that we should spend time talking about, because they’re tragic and awful, but also thankfully rare. There are thousands of arrests that are happening every day that are happening by the book.”
