WASHINGTON (AP) — A shutdown for the Department of Homeland Security appeared certain Thursday as lawmakers in the House and Senate were set to leave Washington for a 10-day break and negotiations with the White House over Democrats’ demands for new restrictions had stalled.
The White House and Democrats have traded offers in recent days as the Democrats have said they want curbs on President Donald Trump’s broad campaign of immigration enforcement. They have demanded better identification for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and other federal law enforcement officers, a new code of conduct for those agencies and more use of judicial warrants, among other requests.
The White House sent its most recent offer late Wednesday, including what Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., said were “concessions” on the part of the Republican administration.
Thune would not say what those concessions were, though, and he acknowledged the sides were “a long ways toward a solution” even as the Senate is scheduled to vote again on the DHS funding.
Democrats did not respond publicly to the White House offer, but Democratic senators voted against a funding bill for the department before leaving town, meaning the funding will expire Saturday without further action. The bill was rejected, 52-47, short of the 60 votes needed for passage.
Lawmakers in both chambers were on notice to return to Washington if the two sides struck a deal to end the expected shutdown. But for now, Democrats say they need to see real changes before they will support DHS funding.
Americans want accountability and “an end to the chaos,” Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer of New York said Thursday before the vote. “The White House and congressional Republicans must listen and deliver.”
Schumer said it was not enough that the administration had announced an end to the immigration crackdown in Minnesota that led to thousands of arrests and the fatal shootings of two protesters.
“We need legislation to rein in ICE and end the violence,” Schumer said, or the actions of the administration “could be reversed tomorrow on a whim.”
Judicial warrants a sticking point
Democrats made the demands for new restrictions on ICE and other federal law enforcement after ICU nurse Alex Pretti was shot and killed by a U.S. Border Patrol officer in Minneapolis on Jan. 24, Some Republicans suggested that new restrictions were necessary. Renee Good was shot by ICE agents on Jan. 7.
Thune, who has urged Democrats and the White House to work together, indicated that one sticking point is the Democratic request for more judicial warrants.
“The issue of warrants is going to be very hard for the White House or for Republicans,” Thune said. “But I think there are a lot of other areas where there has been give, and progress.”
In a list of demands they sent to the White House last week, Schumer and House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries of New York said DHS officers should not be able to enter private property without a judicial warrant and that warrant procedures and standards should be improved. They have said they want an end to “roving patrols” of agents who are targeting people in the streets and in their homes.
Most immigration arrests are carried out under administrative warrants. Those are internal documents issued by immigration authorities that authorize the arrest of a specific person but do not permit officers to forcibly enter private homes or other nonpublic spaces without consent. Traditionally, only warrants signed by judges carry that authority.
But an internal ICE memo obtained by The Associated Press last month authorizes ICE officers to use force to enter a residence based solely on a more narrow administrative warrant to arrest someone with a final order of removal, a move that advocates say collides with Fourth Amendment protections.
White House silence
Congress is trying to renegotiate the DHS spending bill after Trump agreed to a Democratic request that it be separated from a larger spending measure that became law last week. That package extended homeland security funding at current levels only through Friday.
Schumer and Jeffries have said they want immigration officers to remove their masks, to show identification and to better coordinate with local authorities. They have also demanded a stricter use-of-force policy for the federal officers, legal safeguards at detention centers and a prohibition on tracking protesters with body-worn cameras.
Democrats also say Congress should end indiscriminate arrests and require that before a person can be detained, authorities have verified that the person is not a U.S. citizen.
Republicans have been largely opposed to most of the items on Democrats’ list. But Trump has remained relatively silent about the talks.
Impact of a shutdown
Republicans tried to temporarily extend the funding, but Democrats blocked that bill as well.
“We will not support an extension of the status quo,” Schumer said.
The impact of a DHS shutdown is likely to be minimal at first. It would not likely block any of the immigration enforcement operations, as Trump’s tax and spending cut bill passed last year gave ICE about $75 billion to expand detention capacity and bolster enforcement operations.
But the other agencies in the department — including the Transportation Security Administration, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the Secret Service and the Coast Guard — could take a bigger hit over time.
Gregg Phillips, an associate administrator at FEMA, said at a hearing this week that its disaster relief fund has sufficient balances to continue emergency response activities during a shutdown, but would become seriously strained in the event of a catastrophic disaster.
Phillips said that while the agency continues to respond to threats like flooding and winter storms, long-term planning and coordination with state and local partners is “irrevocably impacted.”
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Associated Press writers Seung Min Kim and Rebecca Santana contributed to this report.
