Does Anyone Win

Thune & Johnson announce the apparent path forward on DHS funding...

They will support the bill the Senate passed w/ Dem support at 2am last Friday that funds all of DHS except ICE & CBP, & will attempt to fund CBP & ICE through reconciliation without Dem votes.

Dems get zero…

— Bill Melugin (@BillMelugin_) April 1, 2026

… ICE reforms they had been demanding, but can tell their base they held the line on not funding ICE & CBP and have now established a precedent that ICE and CBP can be separated out.

Republicans were unable to fund ICE & CBP through appropriations after negotiations w/ Senate Dems collapsed, so they will now have to turn to the complicated budget reconciliation process, which will require only a simple majority of 51 votes in the Senate to pass. However, the process could take months, and it's not a guarantee. Trump wants the bill on his desk by June 1st.

All of this as DHS has been unfunded for almost 50 days and a lot of people are hurting in the process.

Does anyone win?

My joint statement with @LeaderJohnThune on DHS funding:

We appreciate and share the President’s determination to once and for all bring an end to the Democrat DHS shutdown.

In the coming days, Republicans in the Senate and House will be following through on the President’s…

— Speaker Mike Johnson (@SpeakerJohnson) April 1, 2026

… directive by fully funding the entire Department of Homeland Security on two parallel tracks: through the appropriations process and through the reconciliation process.

We appreciate that Senator Graham and the Senate Budget Committee have already initiated the process of developing a budget resolution that will ensure border security and immigration enforcement will be funded for the balance of the Trump Administration and insulated from future attempts by the Democrats to defund those agencies.

We operated under a belief that while our country is in the midst of an international armed conflict, Democrats might finally come to their senses and understand that defunding our homeland security agencies is beyond reckless and very dangerous. While we hoped they would accept the 60-day CR to fund the Department entirely so that bipartisan negotiations could continue, it is now abundantly clear that Democrats place allegiance to their radical left-wing base above all else — including their own power of the purse — which means open borders and protecting criminal illegal aliens. That is not acceptable to Republicans in Congress, nor is it to the American people. We cannot allow Democrats to any longer put the safety of the American public at risk through their open border policies, so we are taking that off the table.

In following this two-track approach, the Republican Congress will fully reopen the Department, make sure all federal workers are paid, and specifically fund immigration enforcement and border security for the next three years so that those law-enforcement activities can continue uninhibited. In return, Democrats will once again demonstrate to the American people their support for open borders and keeping criminal illegal immigrants in America.