Lawmakers have an agreement to end the shutdown at the Department of Homeland Security. But a vote will have to wait nearly two more weeks — and potentially longer.
In the meantime, House Speaker Mike Johnson’s, R-La., apology tour is set to continue, as he pitches outraged Republicans on the compromise.
House Republicans opted not to pass a Senate-approved deal to fund most of DHS during a Thursday morning “pro forma” session, during which members gaveled in and out for procedural reasons. Instead, the deal to fund most of the department will have to wait at least until the House’s scheduled return on April 14.
On a private conference call with House Republicans on Thursday, Johnson made it clear to his conference that he has no plans to bring the House back early, according to a source on the call. He even left open the possibility of delaying the vote beyond that date.
Passing the Senate-approved bill during the pro forma session would have been an unusual move, and it would have risked further enraging conservatives who are already unhappy with the plan. But it also would have ended a 47-day shutdown for DHS, the longest funding lapse in history.
The deal is a bitter pill for Johnson, who told House Republicans on the conference call there simply were not any other options left other than moving forward with the Senate bill, which he had dubbed a “crap sandwich” less than a week before.
“In terms of alternative plays, I just think we’re out of them,” Johnson said, according to a source on the call. “I don’t know what else we can do at this point.”
The speaker told his members he “fought vigorously for our position and our principles” throughout the DHS talks.
“I lost my temper at one point,” he said, “and that’s unusual of me.”
House Republicans were shocked at Johnson’s sudden acquiescence to the Senate plan to fund most of DHS but exclude funds for Immigration and Customs Enforcement and some of Customs and Border Protection. Johnson’s conference, and Johnson himself, had trashed the proposal just last week, before leaving for a two-week recess with no plan to fund the department.
House Republicans on Thursday expressed concerns about suddenly capitulating, particularly after so many GOP lawmakers spoke out forcefully.
“I don’t know how we can, with a straight face, turn around and take a position that is both completely ideologically inconsistent with what we said a week ago, and incredibly procedurally dangerous,” Rep. Laurel Lee, R-Fla, said on the call, according to the source.
Rep. Addison McDowell, R-N.C., noted he publicly denigrated the Senate bill, and now he’s supposed to turn around and vote for it.
“I try to carry a principle of, ‘I do what I say I’m gonna do,’ and having just said that I’m not voting for this and then I’m backing this play, then turning around and doing this inside of a week, how do I explain that to my constituents?” McDowell said on the call, according to the source.
Johnson, for his part, argued just last week that House Republicans were rejecting the Senate bill because there was not a clear path for ICE and CBP funding. But now, he argued, the reconciliation wheels are in motion, offering a justification for the reversal.
Members, however, were not convinced.
The speaker left open the possibility of waiting beyond the House’s April 14 return to Washington to vote on the DHS funding bill, potentially holding off until the Senate shows progress on a separate bill to fund ICE and CBP. Republicans will aim to pass money for those agencies through reconciliation, which circumvents the filibuster in the Senate but also tends to move slowly.
As frustrations rise over the prospect of having to support the Senate bill, some Republicans have called on Johnson to take a stand.
During the call, multiple GOP lawmakers said the House should hold off on passing the stopgap until the reconciliation bill passes.
“They have burned us multiple times; we’ve got to do reconciliation first,” Rep. Riley Moore, R-W.Va., said on the call, according to the source. “If we’re holding the other bill, we hold the other bill. However we do that, but we’ve got to do reconciliation first. There’s no trust on this side of the building for the folks in the Senate.”
Rep. John Rutherford, R-Fla., echoed that sentiment.
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“Unless reconciliation comes first, I don’t see any way clear for me to vote for this,” he said.
Faced with those calls, Johnson didn’t give a firm response. “That’s what we got to figure out,” he said at one point, according to the source.
Thursday’s inaction represents a deferred victory for Democrats, who stuck to their weeks-old position that they would not fund ICE or CBP unless they secured policy concessions at those agencies, including a requirement for judicial warrants and a ban on masked agents.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., panned the House GOP’s inaction during Thursday’s pro forma session, saying in a statement Republicans are “needlessly extending the DHS shutdown and hurting federal workers who are missing another paycheck.”
Rep. Don Beyer, D-Va., was the only member in the House chamber on Thursday, other than Rep. Matt Van Epps, R-Tenn., who sat in as speaker for the session. Democrats were told Wednesday there may be a motion to pass the DHS funding deal on Thursday, but it became obvious it would not happen, Beyer said.
Ultimately, he attended simply to see if anyone would try something.
“I was waiting to see whether Chip Roy showed up,” Beyer said, referring to the Texas Republican who singlehandedly stalled billions of dollars in hurricane relief to Puerto Rico during a 2019 pro forma session.
Thursday’s inaction put more pressure on alternative plans to keep DHS running. President Donald Trump wrote on Truth Social that he would “soon sign an order to pay ALL of the incredible employees at the Department of Homeland Security,” without mentioning what legal funding authority he would rely on.
With that pressure point relieved, at least for the moment, the DHS shutdown could drag on much longer.
Republican lawmakers have said they will try to follow up with a reconciliation bill, though that could raise plenty of challenges. Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., told reporters the process is “hard and cumbersome,” but Republicans are quickly starting work.
That future reconciliation bill will fund ICE and CBP for three years, rather than one year, allowing Republicans to avoid further showdowns over DHS, Sen. John Hoeven, R-N.D., told reporters Monday.
In the latest DHS funding proposal, CBP and ICE would have received a combined $28.8 billion for one year. A three-year bill to cover those agencies would likely cost around $86 billion, though customs fees could offset some of that money.
Conservatives have already demanded that the cost of any reconciliation bill be offset with spending cuts to other programs. But that could make it more difficult to secure nearly unanimous support among Republicans in the House and Senate.
Still, GOP leaders were optimistic on Thursday.
“Everybody is, I think, singularly focused on the border,” Thune told reporters. “I would suspect unanimity around the things we have to do on the border — on ICE, on CBP.”
Mychael Schnell is a reporter for MS NOW.
Jack Fitzpatrick covers Congress for MS NOW. He previously reported for Bloomberg Government, Morning Consult and National Journal. He has bachelor's and master's degrees from Arizona State University.