A Murky Road Ahead
The ICE Shutdown
Tonight Department of Homeland Security's annual appropriations will lapse, while the Senate is adjourned until February 23. On the 23rd, we expect Majority Leader Thune to bring up another cloture vote on the motion to proceed to the House-passed DHS bill, which failed yesterday 52-47. The following day, the President is scheduled to deliver the State of the Union.
The 10-day gap between now and when lawmakers return is a political eternity. It’s certainly theoretically possible that a deal will emerge between now and then, but more likely it won’t. The vast majority of key functions within DHS will continue to operate either because they have independent funding (such as ICE under the One Big Beautiful Bill Act) or because they are granted exceptions to continue operations while workers go unpaid. At the top of that list of agencies is TSA, whose workers will start to face reductions in pay the week of March 3.
As a side note, OMB can resume reductions-in-force layoffs, as the language that prohibited those actions expires with the continuing resolution tonight. We know that OMB Director Russ Vought had plans to fire several thousand federal workers prior to the anti-RIF language being included in the last CR.
Little has been reported about the White House’s counteroffer to Democrats’ 10 policy demands to reform ICE, other than that it has been rejected by Democratic leadership. Our understanding is that the White House countered with watered-down versions of the Democrats’ proposals, added poison pills to those policies, and then made new demands of its own.
As with the shutdown in October and November, there is a critical trust gap preventing agreement. At that time, Democrats couldn’t trust the Administration would obey the appropriations laws it passed, as it refused to rule out future impoundments and rescission packages. That lack of trust was only overcome when a small handful of Democrats decided the pain of the shutdown wouldn’t result in any policy victory.
This time around, the trust gap is even wider.
To wit, the Administration just sought a *criminal indictment* against two members of the party it is seeking to negotiate with for filming a video voicing their opinions of the Administration’s actions.
As Sen. Schatz said on the floor this week: “I’m not entirely sure the United States Senate can survive this if we do not have Republicans standing up for our most basic principles.”
State of the Frozen Four
A district judge in Illinois issued a temporary restraining order blocking the Administration from freezing public health funding to four Democratic-run states – California, Colorado, Illinois, and Minnesota. This follows the Administration's targeting of these states on multiple other occasions, including child care funding and Department of Transportation grants.
