Overview
- House Speaker Mike Johnson is holding off on the Senate’s DHS bill until he sees movement on a separate budget reconciliation package for immigration enforcement.
- The Senate has already passed a measure to fund most of DHS through September while leaving ICE and parts of CBP to be financed in a later party-line bill that can bypass a filibuster.
- Hard-right Republicans, led by the House Freedom Caucus, are rejecting the two-track plan and urging one reconciliation bill to fund all of DHS, with some backing Rep. Chip Roy’s push to pair short-term funding with the SAVE America Act.
- President Trump ordered pay for DHS workers and earlier for TSA, and DHS shifted ICE agents to help at airports, but legal experts warn those payments could be challenged under the Antideficiency Act, which bars spending without appropriations.
- Airport screening has seen severe strain from weeks of missed pay and callouts, and the longer Congress delays, the more pressure builds on a June 1 target set by the president for an ICE and CBP funding bill that must also clear strict Senate reconciliation rules.