White House, Dems Exchange New Homeland Security Proposals

A plane preparing to land at Ronald Reagan International Airport earlier this week.
Reuters
By Yuval Rosenberg and Michael Rainey

Good Tuesday evening! The Senate voted 51-48 today to begin what's expected to be a bitter, dayslong debate on the SAVE America Act, the bill to tighten voter registration and ID requirements. President Trump has said the bill is his top legislative priority, and he wants to expand the measure to include his "greatest hits" - the political issues he feels have proven to be popular wedge issues, including prohibitions on transgender women participating in women's sports and transgender surgeries for minors. Despite Trump's push, and similar demands from conservative lawmakers, Republicans know the Senate's marathon debate is more than likely to end in a failed vote.

Here's what else is happening.

White House and Dems Exchange New DHS Proposals, but No Solution in Sight

Senate Democrats have sent the White House a new funding proposal for the Department of Homeland Security, which has been shut down since February 14 as lawmakers battle over the scope of possible reforms at the nation's immigration agencies.

The proposal was reportedly delivered late Monday night, and details have not been released. In exchange for funding DHS, Democrats are demanding significant reforms at Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection, which are housed within DHS, following the killings by federal agents of two U.S. citizens during the Trump administration's immigration crackdown in Minneapolis.

The White House responded Tuesday with a letter that details some of the changes in policy it is willing to make at DHS. In the letter - addressed to Republican Sens. Susan Collins and Katie Britt and signed by Tom Homan, President Trump's "border czar," and James Braid, the White House congressional liaison - the administration says its proposed "improved operation guidelines" include the expanded use of body cameras by DHS agents; limitations on immigration enforcement actions at "certain sensitive sites" such as hospitals and schools; increased oversight at DHS detention facilities; a requirement that DHS agents display proper identification; and a pledge not to deport or detain U.S. citizens.

The letter also accuses Democrats of failing to "show a good faith attempt at compromise" in their previous offers.

Still far apart: The White House offer fails to address Democrats' two main demands: a requirement that immigration officials obtain judicial warrants and a prohibition on agents wearing masks.

"We're trying to move a little bit, but they've got to get serious. They are not getting serious," Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said. "The key issues of warrants when you bust in someone's house. The key issue of identity, of police and no masks. They haven't budged on that."

Senate Minority Leader John Thune was equally unenthusiastic about the latest offer from Democrats. The White House has made concessions, Thune said, but "Democrats seem intent on dragging out this political issue," adding that Democrats "want to defund law enforcement."

Thune also called for more active negotiations. "We got to have a meaningful conversation where we sit down at the table and actually work these issues out," he said. "You can't get there if you're not sitting down at the table."

Some airports could close: As the politicians continue to wrangle over funding for DHS, the nation's transportation system is beginning to feel the pinch. About 50,000 Transportation Security Administration employees have now missed a paycheck, and there are reports of serious delays due to staffing shortages at airports around the country.

Acting Deputy TSA Administrator Adam Stahl said Tuesday that a surge in employee absences may impede operations. "As the weeks continue, if this continues, it's not hyperbole to suggest that we may have to quite literally shut down airports, particularly smaller ones, if call-out rates go up," Stahl said on Fox News.

Quote of the Day

"If it were to be extended, it wouldn't really disrupt the U.S. economy very much at all. It would hurt consumers, and we'd have to think about if that continued, what we would have to do about that, but that's really the last of our concerns right now because we're very confident that this thing is going ahead of schedule."

− National Economic Council Director Kevin Hassett, speaking about the Iran war on CNBC Tuesday morning. Hassett repeated President Trump's claim that the war with Iran would end "soon," which Hassett defined as a matter of weeks rather than months, with a base case of four to six weeks from start to finish.

Hassett's comments come as energy prices remain elevated after Iran responded to U.S. and Israeli attacks by closing the Strait of Hormuz, choking off roughly 20% of the world's oil supply. Oil prices rose again on Tuesday, with Brent April contracts rising more than 3% to $103.26, a three-year high.

For U.S. consumers, diesel prices jumped above $5 a gallon, according to AAA, while gasoline continued to rise, hitting $3.79 a gallon on average.

President Trump has called on U.S. allies and trading partners, including NATO members, China and Japan, to provide military assistance to help reopen the Strait of Hormuz, but to little effect. Trump slammed those countries Tuesday, saying he no longer wants their assistance, writing, "WE DO NOT NEED THE HELP OF ANYONE!"

Stephen Miller Blames National Debt on Spending for 'People Who Don't Belong Here'

Deputy White House Chief of Staff Stephen Miller made an astonishing claim yesterday. At an Oval Office event during which President Trump signed an executive order establishing a task force to address fraud in federal programs, Miller said that improper benefits going to "people who don't belong here" are the main cause of the national debt.

"I believe - and I know President Trump believes - that when this theft is exposed, we will see that if all of it were stopped it would be enough to balance the budget," Miller said. "The extraction of wealth from American taxpayers to people who don't belong here is the primary cause of the national debt, and this is the first ever effort to shut that down."

Miller is widely credited with shaping the Trump administration's immigration policy and its harsh crackdown in Minnesota and elsewhere. His claim regarding the national debt runs counter to the usual explanations given for the federal government's fiscal shortfall - and is dispelled by basic math and previous analyses.

The Government Accountability Office, for example, estimated in 2024 that the federal government loses between $233 billion and $521 billion a year to fraud, based on data from fiscal years 2018 through 2022. The Department of Health and Human Services earlier this year estimated $90.6 billion in improper overpayments by Medicare, Medicaid and certain other federal benefit programs for 2025. Those are all hefty numbers, to be sure, and White House officials have reportedly indicated that the new Trump task force could recover more funds than GAO's estimate. Still, the annual fraud totals likely fall far short of the $1.78 trillion federal budget deficit for fiscal year 2025 let alone the total national debt, now approaching $39 trillion.

The main long-term drivers of the national debt are generally understood to be an aging population, rising healthcare costs and ballooning interest costs on existing debt, combined with a tax system that has seen repeated cuts in recent decades and extraordinary expenses for major wars, the 2008 financial crisis and the Covid-19 pandemic.

What's more, a recent white paper by the Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank, found that immigrants - including those who are undocumented - paid more in taxes to federal, state and local governments than they received in benefits every year over a 30-year period from 1994 to 2023. The report said that immigrants "did not create significantly higher costs" for any programs "and saved the government enormously in two areas: old-age benefits and education costs." Immigrants also use a roughly average amount of "needs-based" assistance, such as welfare, food aid, Medicaid, and unemployment insurance, even though they are much more likely to be poor.

"The fiscal surplus from all immigrants from 1994 to 2023 was $14.5 trillion, compared with a deficit of $48 trillion without immigrants," Cato's David J. Bier wrote. "That means that immigrants cut deficits by nearly a third in real terms over the last three decades."

Bier said that, overall, immigrants accounted for 14% of tax revenue and 7% of government spending from 1994 to 2023. His report also noted that immigrants in the country illegally likely lowered the deficit by at least $1.7 trillion.

"Immigrants are not to blame for government deficits," Bier wrote. "For years, nativists in Congress and the administration have wrongly claimed that immigrants are behind the growth in debt and that the US immigration system allows foreigners to take advantage of Americans' generosity. Our data completely repudiates this view. Immigrants are subsidizing the US government."

Number of the Day: $1 Billion

For the first time, the Capitol Police department is seeking more than $1 billion in annual funding. The request for fiscal 2027 is an increase of 20% over current levels. It includes $734 million for salaries and benefits, $273 million for general expenses and $15.7 million in multiyear funding for security enhancements.

Capitol Police Chief Michael G. Sullivan testified about the request before House appropriators on Tuesday and said that threats against members of Congress "continue to increase at an alarming rate." He said that the department investigated nearly 15,000 statements, behaviors and communications in 2025, up 58% from the prior year - and the pace for 2026 is higher still.

"Lawmakers were largely supportive of Sullivan's request, with several mentioning threats they themselves received," Roll Call reports. "But there was still some sticker shock at a police budget that has more than doubled in the last decade."

Congressional reporter Jamie Dupree noted Tuesday that the Capitol Police request tops the police budgets for big cities like Philadelphia ($870 million), Dallas ($750 million) and D.C. ($600 million) but is lower than those for Chicago ($2.1 billion), Los Angeles ($2.1 billion) and New York ($6.4 billion).

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