US Senate approves deal to fund government and discuss ICE restrictions | US Senate
The US Senate approved a major government funding package on Friday after the killings of two US citizens by federal agents in Minneapolis upended spending talks and gave the out-of-ruling party a rare advantage over Donald Trump’s mass deportation campaign.
By a 71-29 score, the Senate overcame opposition from a handful of Republicans to rally behind a deal the president reached with Democrats; It’s an unusual display of bipartisanship as tensions rise nationally over the presence of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents in U.S. cities.
package still It needs approval from the House of Representatives, which is out of session and not scheduled to return until Monday, meaning the partial shutdown of the federal government is expected to begin when funding expires at midnight Friday.
If the House quickly approves the measure, the impact of the funding cut would likely be minimal because most federal employees do not work weekends, and Trump has promised to sign the package into law as soon as it reaches his desk.
The shooting deaths of Alex Pretti and Renee Good, both U.S. citizens, in Minneapolis amid a swarm of immigration enforcement officers led Senate Democrats to block passage of a measure that would provide funding for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), which oversees ICE. This has jeopardized a wider package of legislation aimed at keeping funding for a number of government departments until September.
Chuck Schumer, the Senate’s top Democrat, outlined a series of reforms to federal agents that he wants included in the DHS funding measure; These include requiring officers to wear body cameras, abide by codes of conduct and stop wearing masks, and conduct “roaming patrols” of people they suspect are in the U.S. illegally.
“If our colleagues are not willing to enact real, powerful change, they should not wait for Democratic votes,” Schumer said after Friday night’s vote. “We have only a few days to deliver real progress to the American people; the eyes of the nation are watching.”
The Senate approved the package after rejecting a series of amendments, including one from Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders that sought to repeal the $75 billion in additional funding for ICE provided by Trump’s so-called “big, beautiful bill” and transfer it to Medicaid. The amendment failed, but in a sign of changing politics, the proposal received two Republican votes.
“We don’t need a domestic military to terrorize people in America; we need to guarantee health care to all Americans,” Sanders said. Republicans argued it was an attempt to “defund” the agency and deny health care to undocumented immigrants.
While the package easily passed the 60-vote threshold required to pass in the Senate, many Democrats have pledged not to approve any additional funding for DHS without clear restrictions on how ICE agents work.
“I meant what I said: I refuse to fund an agency that allows federal agents to kill U.S. citizens with impunity,” Arizona senator Ruben Gallego said in a statement Friday. “We need real reforms and paper accountability.”
Schumer’s office announced Thursday evening that an agreement had been reached with Republicans to quickly pass five bipartisan spending bills in the Senate that would keep departments including defense, labor, health and human services operating through September. DHS funding will be addressed in a stopgap measure lasting two weeks, allowing time for negotiations on Democrats’ demands for reforms to immigration enforcement.
“It’s a pretty bleak moment that we’re in,” said Patty Murray, the top Democratic senator on the appropriations committee that leads negotiations on the spending bill. “I seriously doubt that the White House would have agreed to renegotiate restrictions on DHS without the national outcry of the American people.”
The bill will then go to the Parliament for approval.
“The earliest action we can take is Monday, so we could inevitably end up in a brief shutdown,” Mike Johnson, the Republican speaker of the House of Representatives, told USA Today. “But Parliament will do its part. Like the president, we want to ensure the government’s finances.”
The agreement was expected to come to a vote in the Senate on Thursday evening, but Republican Lindsey Graham reportedly delayed unanimous passage by demanding the removal of a provision that strips lawmakers of their ability to sue the government if phone call records are seized by the FBI as part of the investigation into Trump’s interference in the 2020 election.
An earlier version of the spending bill passed by the House last week repeals that law.
The deal represents an opportunity for Democrats to put up barriers to a mass deportation campaign that began soon after Trump took office a year ago and has seen masked federal agents dispersed into major cities across the country.
The result has been hundreds of thousands of arrests and deportations, as well as killings by ICE agents, detentions of U.S. citizens, and complaints from local leaders and advocacy groups about officers’ brutal tactics and rights violations.
“We’re going to have to evaluate what the real opportunity is to achieve dramatic change at the Department of Homeland Security. It has to be bold, it has to be meaningful, and it has to be transformative,” Democratic House minority leader Hakeem Jeffries said Friday.
But that regulation came together too late to prevent several federal government agencies from closing their doors or restricting services over the weekend and perhaps into Monday, the first business day the shutdown would take effect.
Its acceptance in the Republican-controlled House of Representatives remains uncertain. The House passed both the DHS bill and five spending bills last week; Despite calls to delay the legislation following Good’s killing, seven Democrats had joined the GOP to advance the latter.
But some right-wing lawmakers have demanded that, if the measures return to the House floor, they be implemented alongside legislation called for by conservatives, such as the Savings Act, which would impose an ID requirement to vote that critics say would disenfranchise large swaths of Americans.
“Every appropriations bill voted on in the House MUST HAVE A SAVINGS BILL ATTACHED,” Florida congresswoman Anna Paulina Luna said in a statement Friday.
Since Republicans control the chamber with 218 seats to Democrats’ 213, their opposition could make passage of spending measures difficult. Jeffries warned that Republicans would be to blame if their infighting prevented the spending bill from passing.
“The demands voiced by the far-right at the House Republican conference will go nowhere, and if for any reason Speaker Johnson bends the knee to the far right, then Republicans will shut down the government,” he said.
Even if negotiations stall and DHS spending ends due to restrictions on the administration’s crackdown on immigrants, it is unlikely to stop ICE’s deportation operations. The agency received $75 billion to use from the Big Beautiful Bill Act passed last year, and the Trump administration may also require its employees to continue working during the shutdown.
