The Senate on Friday night passed a package of bills funding a broad range of federal departments and agencies through September along with a two-week stopgap extension of current funding for the Department of Homeland Security. The DHS extension would buy more time for negotiations over Democratic demands for changes to the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement tactics.
But the Senate’s 71-29 vote comes too late to avoid at least a brief funding lapse — and a shutdown — for a broad swath of the federal government, including the Departments of Defense, State, Treasury, Health and Human Services, Labor, Education, Transportation, and Housing and Urban Development. Current funding for agencies covered by the spending package expires at midnight and the House, which will need to approve the spending package, won’t be back from its recess until next week.
Faced with opposition from conservative hardliners, Speaker Mike Johnson reportedly said Friday that he plans to vote on the spending bills under a suspension of House rules, meaning that a two-thirds majority will be needed for passage and a large number of Democratic votes will have to help carry the bill over the finish line.
In the Senate, two dozen Democrats and five Republicans voted against the package, with some Democrats insisting they would not approve more funding for ICE until reforms are enacted.
Some late Senate snags: Senate Democrats had reached a deal with the White House on Thursday to pass the rest of this year’s spending bills except for the one for DHS. But plans to vote on that deal Thursday night required unanimous agreement to speed consideration and were instead delayed by objections from Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina and others, even after President Trump had publicly endorsed the agreement and urged both parties to vote for it.
Graham called the bipartisan agreement “a bad deal.” His hold on the package forced the Senate to adjourn until Friday, when leaders scrambled to find a path forward.
In a Friday speech on the Senate floor, Graham demanded eventual votes on a bill to criminalize the actions of state and local officials in “sanctuary cities” who fail to help enforce federal immigration laws. He also sought to keep federal investigators from accessing the phone records of congressional lawmakers without notifying them. The House had inserted a provision into the spending package repealing a measure passed last year that would allow senators whose phone records were obtained without their knowledge, including Graham, to get six-figure payouts from the government. Graham said he had an agreement with the Ethics Committee that would keep him from benefiting financially.
Some Democrats also demanded amendment votes. In the end, Senate Majority Leader John Thune locked in a package of seven amendment votes leading up to final passage of the funding package.
The short-term funding for DHS, if approved by the House, would buy time for further negotiations over the Trump administration’s immigration crackdown, including Democratic demands for a ban on roving patrols by federal officers, increased use of warrants, a ban on agents wearing masks and a requirement that they wear body cameras.