Trump signs bill restoring DHS funding after record 75-day budget lapse
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President Donald Trump signed a bill to fully restore funding to the Department of Homeland Security, ending a record-breaking 75-day funding cut for the critical agency tasked with protecting U.S. territory.
Trump signed the bill Thursday after the House of Representatives reached a bipartisan agreement to fund DHS. The House approved by voice vote the Senate-passed spending measure that covers most of the department’s appropriations through September.
However, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP), in particular, will remain unfunded under current legislation.
“(TRUMP QUOTE),” Trump said as he signed the bill.
Senate PASSES DHS FUNDING ACT AFTER HOUSE JOHNSON reverses course on 75-DAY SHUTDOWN
President Donald Trump speaks before signing an executive order in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, D.C., on Saturday, April 18, 2026 (Julia Demaree Nikhinson/AP)
The vote came after the Senate’s DHS funding bill sat in the lower chamber for more than a month; House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., refused to table the bill because of objections to language he said would defund law enforcement. The speaker’s opposition reflected the views of many in the Republican conference, who viewed the bill as a dead letter when it passed the Senate unanimously in March.
Johnson changed course this week after the White House sided with the Senate and called for swift passage of the upper chamber bill.
With more than 200,000 personnel, DHS is one of the largest government agencies within the executive branch. In addition to ICE and CBP, many of the nation’s most critical government agencies are covered by DHS, including the Secret Service, Transportation Security Administration (TSA), U.S. Coast Guard, Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), and others.
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House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., speaks at a news conference on Capitol Hill, while House Majority Speaker Tom Emmer, R-Minn. is listening. (Maria Zuhaib/AP)
The DHS funding outage, which lasted approximately 75 days, was the longest partial government shutdown on record in U.S. history.
In an internal memo sent to Hill offices and obtained by Fox News Digital, the White House warned that it would not be able to pay employees starting in May if the Senate did not pass the partial DHS bill in the House. The administration had been using available funds since the beginning of April to cover six weeks of backlogs and a new pay period for DHS workers, but warned it was quickly running out of money.
“If this funding runs out, the Administration will be unable to pay DHS personnel starting in May, which will once again disrupt air travel, leave critical law enforcement officers and the Coast Guard without pay, including our brave Secret Service agents, and jeopardize national security,” the statement said.
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Department of Homeland Security logo. (Andrew Harrer/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
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Republicans are in the process of writing a separate bipartisan package to fund Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Protection (CBP). But that legislation won’t move forward until lawmakers leave Washington for the upcoming holiday season.
Fox News Digital’s Adam Pack and Krista Garvin and Fox News’ Bill Melugin contributed to this report.
