House Republicans Block Senate DHS Bill as Trump Acts to Pay TSA Workers

More than 400 TSA officers have quit their jobs since the Department of Homeland Security funding impasse began, and travelers at George Bush Intercontinental Airport in Houston faced long checkpoint lines as recently as Thursday. Yet on Friday, House Speaker Mike Johnson rejected the Senate's best attempt yet to end the standoff, calling it "a joke" and proposing a different path that remains far from certain to pass.

The Senate passed a bill early Friday that would fund most of DHS but exclude Immigration and Customs Enforcement. House Republicans were angry that the measure did not fund ICE and Border Patrol. Democrats had refused to fund those agencies without changes to immigration enforcement practices.

Johnson announced that the House would instead pursue a continuing resolution funding the entire department at current levels through May 22. "We're going to do something different," Johnson said, challenging the Senate to take up the House's continuing resolution on Monday, assuming it does pass the House, which he acknowledged was uncertain. Johnson said he had spoken with President Donald Trump about the plan and that Trump "supports it."

"We could be standing here right now passing a funding bill with a list of reforms if Democrats had made the smallest effort to actually reach an agreement," Johnson said. "But they didn't."

Senate Republicans, who presented the proposal to Trump earlier in the week, argued that ICE and the Border Patrol could continue to operate using billions of dollars allocated to both agencies through the GOP's sweeping tax and domestic policy bill. Trump had been expected to use funds from that same legislation to pay TSA agents, though it was unclear why he waited more than five weeks after the shutdown began to direct that money.

The impasse has now stretched 42 days. While key operations like TSA and FEMA are still running, many of those employees are working without pay. More than 400 TSA officers have quit since the shutdown began. ICE employees are being paid through Trump's prior legislation.

On Thursday, Trump announced he would act unilaterally to address TSA pay. "I am going to sign an Order instructing the Secretary of Homeland Security, Markwayne Mullin, to immediately pay our TSA Agents in order to address this Emergency Situation, and to quickly stop the Democrat Chaos at the Airports," Trump wrote on social media. The president did not state where the funding would come from.

The Senate measure contains modest provisions lawmakers had already agreed to in January, including money for body cameras for immigration enforcement officers, but falls short of the restrictions Democrats demanded after federal immigration officers killed two American citizens in Minneapolis in January. It does not include provisions barring ICE agents from wearing masks or requiring judicial warrants to enter private homes. NBC News named the two Minneapolis victims as Alex Pretti and Renee Good.

Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer said the outcome could have been reached weeks ago and vowed his party would continue fighting. "Democrats held firm in our opposition that Donald Trump's rogue and deadly militia should not get more funding without serious reforms," Schumer said.

Republican Sen. Susan Collins, who chairs the Senate Appropriations Committee, pushed back hard, saying Democrats had damaged Congress' annual funding process and weakened national security. "Democrats remained intransigent and unreasonable with their list of demands," Collins said.

Senate Democrats plan to seek unanimous consent Monday to fund just the TSA, which would mark the eighth time they have attempted that maneuver. Republicans have rejected every prior stand-alone bill. House Appropriations Committee Chairman Tom Cole of Oklahoma warned that if no deal is reached, agencies including FEMA, TSA, CISA, the U.S. Secret Service, and the U.S. Coast Guard would bear the brunt of a deeper shutdown, while ICE and Customs and Border Protection retain funding from prior legislation.

Should the House approve the Senate measure and Trump sign it, the deal would end a negotiating standoff that has caused the longest partial government shutdown on record. Whether the House will even bring the Senate bill to a vote remains uncertain, with hard-right Republicans opposing any measure that does not include new money for immigration enforcement.