Senate Democrats and the White House reached a deal Thursday to stave off a prolonged government shutdown when current funding for many federal agencies expires on Friday night.
The agreement reportedly calls for the Senate to vote on five full-year spending bills from a package passed by the House last week while replacing a sixth bill covering the Department of Homeland Security with a two-week stopgap measure that allows for more negotiations on policies to rein in the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement tactics.
As negotiations intensified, the Senate voted 45-55 against moving ahead with debate on a six-bill funding package approved last week by the House. Eight Republicans joined with all Senate Democrats in voting to block the funding package, though one of the eight was Senate Majority Leader John Thune, who switched from a yes vote so as to be able to bring the funding bills up for another vote once a deal was struck.
The six-bill House-passed package would provide funding through September covering more than 75% of the federal government’s annual discretionary spending, including the Departments of Defense, Health and Human Services, State and Treasury, But the inclusion of $64.4 billion in funding for the Department of Homeland Security threatened to derail the larger package, as Democratic anger over the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement swelled following last Saturday’s killing of Alex Pretti, an ICU nurse, by federal immigration agents in Minneapolis.
Democrats insisted that the DHS funding bill be stripped out of the larger package while making clear that they would be willing to quickly approve the remaining five bills. Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer yesterday laid out reforms that Democrats want to see made to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, insisting that those demands be met before his party agrees to fund DHS. House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries on Thursday added a demand that the deportation of American citizens be banned.
In addition to ICE, the DHS funding bill would also cover the Federal Emergency Management Agency, Coast Guard, Transportation Security Administration and other agencies.
A final sticking point: Negotiations over the measure to temporarily fund DHS and allow more time for negotiations reportedly centered on the length of the stopgap measure, with Senate Democrats seeking to extend current funding by two weeks or less. Republicans were looking for “no less than four weeks” of funding, GOP Sen. Markwayne Mullin of Oklahoma told reporters.
What’s next: Senate leaders reportedly were working to secure an agreement to speed passage of the funding deal, with hopes that a vote on the five full-year spending bills and the stopgap for DHS could happen as soon as tonight.
With the midnight Friday deadline drawing closer, a short-term funding lapse appears likely given that the House isn’t scheduled to be back from its recess until Monday and lawmakers there will need to vote on changes made by the Senate.
House Republican leaders reportedly were considering trying to have lawmakers come back Sunday if the Senate approves the funding bills tonight. Conservative hardliners in the House Republican conference have already come out against reopening the funding package and have threatened to seek their own demands for a revamped DHS bill, presenting challenges for House Speaker Mike Johnson and potentially complicating final passage. “How quickly Johnson can quell House infighting will determine how long a partial government shutdown will last,” Politico’s Meredith Lee Hill suggested in a post on X.
President Trump publicly endorsed the new deal in a social media post Thursday evening. “Hopefully, both Republicans and Democrats will give a very much needed Bipartisan ‘YES’ Vote,” he wrote.
The bottom line: Congress is set to blow past the Friday night shutdown deadline, but the Senate has at least reached a revised funding deal to prevent a prolonged shutdown. The process could move quickly from here…or not.