Democrats Score a Win!
The Senate GOP finally caved on a DHS deal early Friday morning after Trump said on Thursday he would sign an emergency order, bypassing Congress, to pay TSA agents. Around 46,000 workers were about to face their second pay period without a full paycheck.
At around 2:30am Friday morning, the Senate voted by voice mail to fund DHS — with the exception of its brownshirt department in charge of immigration and deportation enforcement.
John Thune criticized the “piecemeal” deal, saying they were running out of time with the insistence of Democrats to change ICE policies.
The political football will be handed off to Mike Johnson, as the House is scheduled to convene on Friday morning.
TACO Trump said earlier on Thursday that he was signing an emergency order to get TSA agents paid.
Apparently Trump was planning to use funding from the Big Beautiful Bill, with aides trying to figure out how to make it happen.
The OBBB provided DHS with $165 billion, with $75 billion funneled to ICE, and $64 billion to CBP.
Paychecks for officers in ICE, CBP and the US Secret Service, US Coast Guard military personnel, as well as immigration technology specialists and lawyers are all funded by the Butt-Ugly Bill. There is also $10 billion that can be used to support the border mission, and this pot is where it is suspected the TSA will be paid from, even while TSA is not mentioned in the legislation. The maneuver may not even be legal.
(when has that mattered?)
Earlier on Wednesday and Thursday, the Senate had the floor open for five hours with hopes of passing a deal, but Republicans refused to budge on Democrats’ ICE reform demands.
Senate GOP Whip John Barasso told reporters, “We’ve had the vote open for five hours to give the Democrats an opportunity to come to the table. They have not, and now time is up.”
Democratic Whip Brian Schatz said that was not true. “We’ve been in contact all day, all day.”
John Fetterman chose to vote with Republicans.