Why No One Won This Government Shutdown Fight

WASHINGTON — After weeks of stalled negotiations, the U.S. Senate early Friday morning finally approved funding for most of the Homeland Security Department, ending a six-week impasse that caused havoc at airports and disrupted travel for many travelers.

But despite all the pain, no one got what they really wanted. Republicans didn’t win more funding for ICE and CBP, the two agencies leading President Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown, as they had pushed for. And Democrats didn’t secure the reforms to ICE they wanted following the deaths of two Americans by federal immigration agents in Minnesota earlier this year.

“That ship has sailed. They kissed that opportunity goodbye by failing to provide funding for those agencies,” Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) said Friday after the funding bill passed Friday just after two o’clock in the morning via a voice vote.

Democrats, meanwhile, said the outcome could have been reached weeks ago when they initially proposed leaving off ICE and CBP funding from the rest of the package, which included money for the Transportation Security Administration, U.S. Coast Guard, and the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

“Democrats held firm in our opposition that Donald Trump’s rogue and deadly militia should not get more funding without serious reforms, and we will continue to fight for those reforms,” Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said in a speech on the Senate floor.

But while Democrats stayed united in denying additional funds to ICE, their larger goal of reforming an agency that has used violent tactics against noncitizens and citizens alike will likely go unfulfilled. ICE will keep operating as normal thanks to $75 billion it received from Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill last year. The funding bill that passed Friday included some money for body-worn cameras and de-escalation training, but it lacked other changes Democrats wanted, such as requiring that agents ID themselves, stop wearing masks and obtain judicial warrants before forcibly entering homes.

Like in the previous shutdown fight over extending Affordable Care Act insurance subsidies, Democrats didn’t manage to extract any policy concessions from Republicans. Forcing a government shutdown while you’re in the congressional minority to extract policy concessions still has never worked for either party, even if it does thrill base voters eager to see their politicians put up a fight.

But both the full-fledged government shutdown over health care last year and this year’s shutdown of DHS helped Democrats drive a contrast with Trump, who continued pursuing unpopular policies (cutting off SNAP aid, invading Iran) and self-aggrandizement (tearing down the East Wing, putting his name on U.S. currency) while generally doing little to solve the immediate crisis. It’s driven down Trump’s poll numbers, with many GOP lawmakers retiring this year ahead of a likely blue wave.

Senate Republicans also left town on Friday for a previously scheduled two-week Easter recess without taking further action on the SAVE America Act, a huge priority of Trump and his conservative allies. For weeks, proponents of the sweeping elections bill that would require proof of citizenship to vote — such as a passport or birth certificate — demanded the Senate cancel the recess and stay in session until the bill is passed, warning that Republicans would suffer a bloodbath in the midterm elections if it doesn’t happen.

“Don’t worry about Easter — going home,” Trump said earlier this week. “In fact, make this one for Jesus, OK? Make this one for Jesus, that’s what I tell them. It would be a damn good thing.”

But no Republican objected to the Senate recessing on Friday, not even Sen. Mike Lee (Utah), a leading advocate of the bill, who had been calling on the Senate to debate it for months or as long as necessary to get it passed. Lee wasn’t on the floor early Friday when it passed. He’s instead urging angry House Republicans to reject the Senate’s funding draft and attach the SAVE America Act to it, something that would almost certainly prolong the DHS shutdown, since the Senate isn’t scheduled to return to Washington until April 13.

Even if House Republicans reject the Senate funding bill, as House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) has indicated, TSA workers will still likely be paid thanks to an executive order by Trump that he signed on Friday. The president issued a national emergency to dole out the funds, circumventing Congress, which has authority over spending.

“It is not an easy thing to do, but I am going to do it!” Trump wrote in a post on his social media platform Truth Social. “I want to thank our hardworking TSA Agents and also, ICE, for the incredible help they have given us at the Airports. I will not allow the Radical Left Democrats to hold our Country hostage any longer.”

That’s a little late for the more than 480 TSA workers who have quit since the shutdown began in February, and even more who have gone through difficulties without pay.