Senate Republican leaders are laying the groundwork for a vote next week on a budget blueprint required before they can pass a party-line reconciliation bill providing somewhere in the neighborhood of $75 billion for immigration enforcement agencies at the Department of Homeland Security, which has officially been shut down for two months.
The Senate GOP plan reportedly seeks to fund Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection for three and a half years, bypassing Democrats, who have refused to provide more money for the agencies without reforms after federal agents shot and killed two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis earlier this year. Democrats have demanded that federal immigration agents be required to obtain judicial warrants for searches of private property and be prohibited from wearing masks in most cases, among other reforms.
Senate Budget Committee Chair Lindsey Graham is reportedly preparing the budget resolution, which would direct the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs and the Judiciary Committee to write the legislation.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune said this week that he is pushing for a very narrowly focused bill — “anorexic-like skinny,” he reportedly called it — that would exclude provisions sought by other Republicans, including spending cuts to offset the new funding. The hope is that by doing so, Republicans can move quickly, steer clear of some politically sensitive votes and avoid delays and infighting that would threaten the measure. “To execute on it and do it with any kind of speed, you’ve got to keep it really tight,” Thune reportedly said Monday.
Not all Republicans are on board with that approach, though. Some Senate Republicans are pushing for their priorities to be included, arguing that this is likely their last chance to enact some of those policies. On the House side, conservatives want to see all of DHS funded via the reconciliation bill and other agenda items included as well.
Republican Rep. Chip Roy, a leading member of the House Freedom Caucus, said in a post on X Monday evening that Thune isn’t the only one deciding the shape of the reconciliation bill. Roy argued that Republicans should not be looking to separate ICE and CBP from the regular appropriations process. “Isolating DHS was stupid. Isolating ICE/CBP is worse,” Ropy wrote. “We should move other priorities with ALL of DHS… we’re running out of time to deliver and to clean up these repeated swamp messes.”
Some conservatives are also calling for the reconciliation bill to include elements of the Save America Act, the package of new voting restrictions that President Trump has called his top legislative priority. That bill can’t pass the Senate.
The bottom line: Republicans are looking to move quickly and are reportedly considering bypassing a Senate Budget Committee vote on the forthcoming blueprint, instead moving the bill right to the Senate floor. Fiscal hawks may take issue with Thune’s plan, but Trump supports it and has called for the reconciliation bill to reach his desk by June 1.