GOP tensions over DHS funding intensify between Senate, House Republicans

Tensions between Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) and Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) are escalating after Saturday’s shooting at the Washington Hilton put new focus on a stalled Homeland Security funding bill passed by the Senate last month.

Members of the Senate Republican leadership team said the assassination attempt against President Trump should spur House Republicans to immediately pass a Senate-approved bill to fund most of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), including the Secret Service, whose officers stopped an armed assailant within a few feet of the Hilton’s ballroom.

“I think it was incumbent on them well before this even happened” to pass the Senate bill “with the threat assessment at a very high level given the [conflict] with Iran,” Sen. Steve Daines (R-Mont.) said when asked if the shooting puts pressure on House Republicans to act.

“Frankly, it’s ridiculous we haven’t got this resolved,” he said.

Daines, an adviser to the GOP leadership team, along with Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), Katie Britt (R-Ala.) and Bernie Moreno (R-Ohio), presented the Senate Republican plan to Trump last month.

The plan would fund as much of the Department of Homeland Security as possible through the regular appropriations process and then boost funding for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Border Patrol through the budget reconciliation process.

Sen. James Lankford (Okla.), the vice chair of the Senate GOP conference, said “it’s way past time” for the House to vote on the bill that the Senate approved unanimously on March 27.

Britt, the chair of the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Homeland Security, said Secret Service employees will stop getting paychecks after Saturday and called on Congress to resolve the funding impasse this week.

She emphasized that she would prefer to fund all of the Department of Homeland Security, including ICE and Border Patrol, at once, but acknowledged “we are where we are” because Democrats have blocked funding for those agencies without significant reforms to immigration enforcement operations.

Britt said the Secret Service is “chief among” agencies bearing the strain of the partial government shutdown.

“For 72 days they have gone without their mission being funded. That’s a problem. That’s absolutely a problem,” she said.

“The very least we can do is actually fund the mission that is before us. We saw the importance of that this weekend,” she said, referring to the assassination attempt at the Hilton. “We need to make this happen and we need to make it happen this week.”

Britt said the “vast majority” of funding for Secret Service employees and other critical federal workers will run out this weekend.

“That’s part of the problem here,” she said. “The time to act is now.”

Johnson, however, rejected calls on Monday to pass the Senate bill, which would not fund ICE and Border Patrol, criticizing the Senate measure as “haphazardly drafted.”

The Speaker instead floated a proposal to amend the bill and send it back to the Senate.

That idea didn’t appear to have much traction with Thune, who told reporters Monday that the Senate has already twice sent legislation to the House that would fund most of Homeland Security through September.

“It has some problematic language because it was haphazardly drafted and so we’ve stated our objections about that very clearly,” Johnson told reporters Monday afternoon.

“We have a modified version that I think is going to be much better for both chambers. It doesn’t change most of the substance but it makes sure that we’re not going to orphan two of the primary agencies of DHS,” he said, referring to ICE and Border Patrol. “We have to makes sure that immigration law is enforced and the border is safe and secure.”

The net result of the Senate-House impasse is that the Homeland Security shutdown will drag on while Republicans in the two chambers of Congress point at each other.

While Republicans have mainly blamed Democrats for the lapse of the Homeland Security Department’s funding on Feb. 14, the standoff between Thune and Johnson over how to handle the Senate-passed bill to fund the Transportation Security Administration, Federal Emergency Management Agency and the Secret Service has become increasingly embarrassing for the GOP.

“I think the standoff is now between the two Republican leaders in the House and Senate,” said Senate Democratic Whip Dick Durbin (Ill.), who noted ICE and Border Patrol are due to get another funding windfall through the budget reconciliation process.

The language in the Senate-passed bill zeroes out funding for ICE and Border Patrol, and House Republicans want to cut that language so it doesn’t appear that they would be voting for a bill to defund those two agencies.

But Senate Republicans largely view the House demand to rewrite the bill as a quibble over semantics that could derail the legislation entirely, as there’s no guarantee that they would be able to pass it in the Senate.

Thune said the Senate “did everything we can to ensure that everything is appropriately funded,” noting that the Senate has “twice” sent the bill to fund most of the Homeland Security Department to the House.

He also pointed out that ICE and Border Patrol are sitting on more than $100 billion in unobligated funding passed in last year’s One Big Beautiful Bill Act, and that the Senate has started the budget reconciliation process to allocate an additional $70 billion to $80 billion to fund those agencies through 2029.

“Our work in terms of the funding process is well underway here, and hopefully that will be enough to get the House in a comfortable position,” he said.

Last month, Thune was able to secure unanimous consent in the Senate during the middle of the night — something that senators agreed to in part because they were eager to leave town for the Easter recess after spending five consecutive weeks in legislative session.

Senior Republicans say the ball is in Johnson’s court.

“I hope the House will pass the Senate bill and we’ll do reconciliation,” Senate Budget Committee Chair Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) told reporters at a press conference about his plan to authorize $400 million to build a secure ballroom at the White House.

Johnson, the Speaker, last week said he didn’t want to move the Senate-passed bill funding most of the Homeland Security Department until the Senate passed a budget reconciliation package funding ICE and Border Patrol through 2029.

The Senate took the first step last week toward unlocking the reconciliation process, which would allow Republicans to circumvent a Democratic filibuster, by passing a budget resolution during a marathon voting session that went past 3 a.m. Thursday.

But Thune warned Thursday that Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin will run out of money to pay federal workers through executive authority before the Senate is able to complete the time-consuming budget reconciliation process.

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