So, this happened last evening:
Critics might note that this is an unconstitutional use of presidential power, but he did this selectively during the historically long shutdown this past fall and got away with it. (To say nothing of launching a major war against Iran without Congressional authorization.)
One might wonder why he didn’t pay our hardworking TSA Agents during that last shutdown. Or earlier in this one. But those are really just details.
It may be academic, anyway, because it appears that the impasse may end, anyway.
NBC News (“Senate agrees to fund DHS, except ICE and Border Patrol, in bid to end 40-day shutdown“):
The Senate agreed unanimously early Friday to fund the Department of Homeland Security after a 40-day shutdown, but without funding for immigration enforcement and deportation operations.
Senators approved the package at 2:20 a.m by voice vote following a marathon session, hours after President Donald Trump announced that he would sign an order to immediately pay Transportation Security Administration officers.
The deal followed arduous bipartisan negotiations that occurred in fits and starts over the last six weeks. It is expected to have Trump’s support but faces an uncertain future in the House.
It would fund all of DHS except ICE Enforcement and Removal Operations and parts of Customs and Border Protection, which Democrats have refused to vote for without significant reforms to enforcement practices.
Referring to the possibility of the House considering the package later Friday, Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D) said “hopefully they’ll be around, and we can get at least a lot of the government opened up again, and then we’ll go from there.” He said he texted with Speaker Mike Johnson tonight.
One suspects this will pass the House. Trump had previously indicated that he wouldn’t sign a bill that didn’t include the so-called SAVE Act, but presumably he’s changed his mind, or else Senate Republicans wouldn’t have signed on to this.
Given that ICE and the Border Patrol are already funded through the so-called Big Beautiful Bill passed last year, it’s not at all clear what Democrats got from all of this pain and suffering.
UPDATE: Welp, I was wrong on House Republicans.
AP (“House Republicans reject DHS funding bill from Senate, risking an even longer shutdown“):
House Republicans are rejecting a Senate-passed bill to fund most of the Department of Homeland Security, a revolt that risks delaying a resolution to the funding impasse now in its 42nd day that has created long lines at many of the nation’s airports.
“This gambit that was done last night is a joke,” House Speaker Mike Johnson said Friday.
Johnson said that instead House Republicans would seek to pass a bill that would fund the entire department at current levels until May 22. He also said that he had spoken with President Donald Trump about the House Republican plan and the president “supports it.”
House Republicans are angry that the bill passed early Friday by the Senate does not fund Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Border Patrol. Democrats refused to fund those departments without changes to immigration enforcement practices.
“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 is uncertain.
Senators have already left town after acting in the early morning hours to end the partial shutdown, so it would take time for them to return if the House ends up passing a different measure. And Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer said in a social media post that the 60-day stopgap measure being considered in the House would be “dead on arrival in the Senate, and Republicans know it.”
Brilliant. This seems like a rather obvious own-goal.
