Johnson Caves on Senate DHS Funding Deal He Spurned Last Week

Congress is poised to fund most of the Department of Homeland Security in the next few days, potentially ending the longest government shutdown of any kind.

The decision is an about-face from a bitter cross-Capitol funding fight that commenced last week when the Senate unanimously passed and sent a deal to the House to fund the department, excluding portions for immigration enforcement, in the early morning hours Thursday.

After the Senate left town, House Republicans rejected the Senate’s deal and refused to bring it to the floor for a vote. Instead, they sent back their own proposal: a bill that extended the department’s funding for 60 days. Senate leaders insisted their plan was the way forward and ignored the short-term patch while House Republicans began a two-week recess, blaming the Senate for the impasse.

But the disagreement ended Wednesday when House Speaker Mike Johnson and Senate Majority Leader John Thune released a joint statement. They announced that Republicans “in the coming days” would be following Trump’s order to fund DHS “on two parallel tracks: through the appropriations process and through the reconciliation process.”

On top of reopening the department, Republicans plan to fund immigration enforcement and border security for the next three years.

Despite the House and Senate’s ugly feud hitting an apex last week, the latest statement from Johnson and Thune specifically blamed Democrats.

“We hoped they would accept the 60-day CR to fund the Department entirely so that bipartisan negotiations could continue, it is now abundantly clear that Democrats place allegiance to their radical left-wing base above all else,” the statement said.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said in a statement on Wednesday that the Democratic Caucus was united throughout the funding fight. He blamed Republicans for the delay in reopening the agency.

“For days, Republican divisions derailed a bipartisan agreement, making American families pay the price for their dysfunction,” Schumer said. “Throughout this fight, Senate Democrats never wavered. We were clear from the start: fund critical security, protect Americans, and no blank check for reckless ICE and Border Patrol enforcement.”

The Senate Budget Committee has already started crafting a budget resolution to fund immigration enforcement and border protection “for the balance of the Trump Administration,” the statement said.

Their statement comes after Trump announced on Wednesday that he supported the Senate-passed plan to reopen the agency.

“That’s why we are going forward to fund our incredible ICE Agents and Border Patrol through a process that doesn’t need Radical Left Democrat votes, and bypasses the Senate Filibuster (which should be repealed, IMMEDIATELY!), working in close conjunction with House Speaker Mike Johnson and Senate Leader John Thune,” Trump posted on Truth Social.

Trump’s support of the Senate-passed bill is a reversal from his position last week. Johnson said in a news conference Friday that Trump supported and understood the House’s plan to reject the Senate proposal.

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries blamed Republicans for the historic shutdown but expressed his support for the measure in a statement on Wednesday.

“Mike Johnson and House Republicans have come to realize that we will never bend the knee,” Jeffries said. “It’s time to pay TSA agents, end the airport chaos and fully fund every part of the Department of Homeland Security that does not relate to Donald Trump’s violent mass deportation machine.”

Senate Democrats had demanded that any bill to fund DHS include specific reforms of Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection, leading to a stalemate in the upper chamber that has lasted 45 days. Funding measures require 60 votes to pass the Senate, mandating some bipartisan support.

The reconciliation process would instead allow both chambers to pass funding for those contentious agencies along party lines. Trump’s message on social media called on Congress to send him a bill by June 1.

This story was updated with new information.