Congress

Democrats confront an ICE dilemma: To rein it in, they have to fund it

Published

5 months ago

January 14, 2026

New calls to “defund ICE” are reverberating through the Democratic Party following last week’s deadly shooting by a federal agent in Minneapolis. Behind the scenes, top Democrats are feverishly working to fund the agency — with strings attached.

The mismatch between the anti-ICE rhetoric and the actions of Democratic appropriators reflects a Catch-22 of congressional power: The only way lawmakers can put guardrails on the controversial agency and curb President Donald Trump’s immigration enforcement agenda at this moment is to hand it billions of taxpayer dollars.

As they negotiate fiscal 2026 funding for the Department of Homeland Security with Republicans ahead of a Jan. 30 shutdown deadline, Democrats are demanding new rules for DHS agents, such as forcing them to use body cameras, refrain from wearing masks and go through more extensive training.

Even as new polling fielded after the fatal Jan. 7 shooting of Renee Good shows that a plurality of voters back ICE’s elimination, top Democrats on Capitol Hill are seeking to restrain the agency under Trump’s leadership — not disband it.

“House Democrats want accountability and oversight of ICE,” Rep. Pete Aguilar of California, the No. 3 Democratic leader, told reporters Tuesday. “They should have to continue to testify to Congress as to what they are doing. But more importantly, we need to look out for the American people right now. They are terrorizing people in the streets of this country.”

Among the rank-and-file, there is also a deep desire to rein in the agency. Rep. Darren Soto (D-Fla.), deputy chair of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, said in an interview his group supports “reforms” for the agency.

“It’s not the CHC’s position that we’re terminating ICE,” Soto said. “But there is a culture of violence that’s happening that does need to be addressed.”

The Congressional Progressive Caucus, meanwhile, announced Tuesday it had “adopted an official position” opposing new DHS funding “unless there are meaningful and significant reforms to immigration enforcement practices.”

It’s not clear what GOP leaders are willing to accept in return for the Democratic votes that will be necessary to pass any DHS funding bill. They have not publicly ruled out new rules for ICE, despite equating Democrats’ demands with support for lax immigration policies.

“Understand, what happened last week gave them more things to yell about,” House Majority Leader Steve Scalise told reporters this week, referring to Democrats’ response to the shooting. “But they’ve been against ICE — and frankly, they’ve been for open borders, more importantly — for years as well.”

Part of a calculation for both sides is that the alternatives to a negotiated compromise are unsavory for each party. Democratic lawmakers are in no mood to default to a lengthy stopgap funding patch that would maintain the status quo on immigration enforcement and give the Trump administration more leeway to decide how the money is spent. And if Republicans refuse to enact restraints, they warn, funding for DHS could lapse altogether in a few weeks.

“The question is for Republicans: Are they willing to shut down the government simply to endorse the most lawless Department of Homeland Security in the history of the country?” Connecticut Sen. Chris Murphy, the top Democrat on the Homeland Security funding panel, said on NBC’s “Meet the Press” over the weekend.

Despite the tough rhetoric, Murphy showed a willingness to compromise in comments to reporters this week. Appropriators, he said, are “not going to write a comprehensive immigration enforcement reform bill” within the DHS funding measure.

“But in every bill there’s language on how our money is spent. And I want to make sure that our money is spent lawfully,” he continued. “So yes, we’re having conversations about how we can pass a bill — but a bill that makes sure that ICE is operating legally.”

One of the challenges for lawmakers is that Republicans already gave ICE billions of dollars within the party-line tax and spending package they enacted over the summer. The “big, beautiful bill” included $75 billion for the agency over the following decade, above and beyond the nearly $11 billion it was granted in the fiscal year that ended in September.

“It’s important to understand that a lot of the funding that’s being unleashed on the American people in such extreme ways right now was provided not through the traditional appropriations process,” House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries told reporters this week.

In spite of the major roadblocks to clinching a bipartisan funding deal, there are lawmakers on both sides of the aisle who are interested in putting at least some fetters on immigration enforcement agencies.

The day after the fatal shooting in Minnesota, GOP Sen. Lisa Murkowski of Alaska said footage of the killing was “deeply disturbing” and called for “policy changes to help prevent future tragedies” that would ensure ICE agents work “safely — and with empathy and respect for human life.”

Both Democrats and Republicans in the Senate objected to moving forward this week with the DHS funding bill, House Appropriations Chair Tom Cole (R-Okla.) said, forcing it to be stripped from a planned multibill package at the 11th hour.

“This one’s tricky, just simply because of the political situation,” Cole told reporters. “We’re trying to work with our colleagues. I know they’re trying to get a bill. But I’m very sensitive to the political challenges they have on this particular bill.”

Senate Appropriations Chair Susan Collins (R-Maine) also acknowledged this week that “obviously the agency and some of its actions have raised questions lately,” adding that while a deal on DHS funding hasn’t yet been notched, “it doesn’t mean it won’t be eventually.”

Even before the shooting in Minnesota, lawmakers in both parties had agreed to new limits on the Trump administration’s ability to redirect DHS money to purposes other than what Congress prescribes.

Rep. Mark Amodei, the Nevada Republican who chairs the Homeland Security funding panel, told reporters last week that House and Senate appropriators are crafting the spending measure to make it “harder to make the money mobile.”

He called the Trump administration’s penchant for shifting around cash “bullshit” and acknowledged that Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem would not be fond of the new restrictions.

On Tuesday, Amodei struck an upbeat note on the negotiations, saying the DHS bill is “progressing nicely.”

Calen Razor contributed to this report.

Congress

Congressional Black Caucus blasts Slotkin over her calls for new leadership in the House

Published

18 hours ago

June 27, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

The Congressional Black Caucus is emphatically declaring its support for House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries — and denouncing Sen. Elissa Slotkin’s call for new leadership in Congress.

In a statement posted to social media on Friday, the entirely Democratic CBC declared that it stands united behind the nation’s first Black minority leader of the House. The caucus accused the Michigan senator of “posturing for higher office in 2028” and called attention to her votes to approve multiple members of President Donald Trump’s Cabinet.

“House Democrats don’t need a lesson on reading the political moment from someone who handed Donald Trump one of the most corrupt Cabinets in American history,” the CBC said. “Voting to confirm Kristi Noem, Pam Bondi, and five other Trump Cabinet secretaries is not the posture of someone who understood the moment’ after 2024.”

The CBC closed its defense of Jeffries with a sharp parting shot of remaining focused on providing for Americans rather than “engaging in distractions that only serve to divide Democrats at a moment when unity and resolve are essential.”

A spokesperson for Slotkin, who has repeatedly called for a new generation of leadership in Congress, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Congress

Key Democrats urge House to reject kids’ safety proposal

Published

21 hours ago

June 26, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

The Commerce Committee’s top Democrat Maria Cantwell (Wash.) and Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) warned House lawmakers against advancing their chamber’s version of the Kids Online Safety Act, arguing it would face intense lobbying from tech companies in the Senate and risk unraveling years of bipartisan work.

“If it is passed by the House it will come to the Senate,” Blumenthal, the bill’s Senate cosponsor, told reporters at a Friday press briefing. The Connecticut Democrat said he is concerned senators will be influenced by the tech industry’s “armies of lawyers and lobbyists” who may “confuse and exploit” misunderstandings about a House bill with the same name as a Senate version but excludes key provisions, such as the “duty of care.” (This concept requires online companies to design social media platforms with an eye for children’s safety.)

“We’re not going to let bad legislation with a good title just get across and think somebody’s done something,” Cantwell said.

The House version of KOSA — which is included in the KIDS Act, a revised bipartisan package that the Energy and Commerce Committee advanced along party lines in March — is scheduled to be considered on the House floor next week under suspension of the rules.

“We need to stop this bill in the House, and we need to prevent the White House from forming an alliance with Big Tech on this issue,” said Blumenthal, who characterized the version of KOSA that House leadership is pushing as a “sham.”

Both Democratic lawmakers also expressed concern that Senate Commerce Committee Chair Ted Cruz (R-Texas) could adopt the House version of KOSA in a kids’ safety package he has yet to publicly release but has pledged to markup by August recess. Cruz said “negotiations are ongoing” earlier this week when asked by Blue Light News whether he would be open to incorporating such changes put forward in the House.

Cruz’s package is expected to include KOSA as well legislation barring companies from using minors’ personal data for targeted advertising, banning kids under age 13 from social media, and providing greater oversight for how children interact with AI chatbots.

Although Blumenthal remains hopeful that Cruz will “stay true to his first vote in favor of KOSA,” which overwhelmingly passed in the Senate last Congress, the Connecticut Democrat said Friday he’s worried Cruz and others may be tempted to “take the bait” and abandon the bill’s basic principles.

Congress

Moderates beware: Mamdani coalition portends a dramatically different Democratic Party in NYC

Published

1 day ago

June 26, 2026

Blue Light Newsroom

NEW YORK — A coalition powered by Mayor Zohran Mamdani expanded the left’s reach Tuesday, winning younger voters across racial and ethnic lines and once again upending conventional wisdom about elections in New York City.

A series of hotly contested congressional and state elections pit a slate of Mamdani-backed democratic socialists and progressives against establishment candidates who, in several cases, differed little on policy aside from U.S.-Israel relations.

The results were staggering.

Midterm election cycles in deep-blue New York City tend to be sleepy affairs. Both this year and in 2022, just over 500,000 people cast ballots, less than 20 percent of eligible voters. But turnout within a congressional district spanning Upper Manhattan and the Bronx increased by roughly 50 percent between 2022 and Tuesday, with more than 66,000 voters heading to the polls.

In another seat covering parts of Brooklyn and Queens, turnout more than doubled from 2022, though state and federal elections were held on different days that year and the seat was not competitive, which would have reduced the number of voters going to the polls.

Congressional candidates backed by the Democratic Socialists of America were able to replicate the mayor’s success by winning younger Latino voters in Brooklyn and a majority of Black voters in Harlem. Combined with the DSA’s base in relatively wealthy neighborhoods, the result charted the far left’s broadening appeal and a potential reorientation of the electorate that will influence races for years to come.

“This was a big wave for DSA and they did a good job capitalizing on it,” said Evan Roth Smith, a pollster with Slingshot Strategies. “The question now is: Was this a wave cycle that will abate, or is it the start of the takeover?”

Much of Mamdani’s base is concentrated in the so-called “commie-corridor,” a series of neighborhoods along the Brooklyn-Queens waterfront filled with young, educated and affluent voters who’ve propelled several DSA candidates into office. They went gaga over Mamdani’s candidacy and, as Tuesday’s results show, will turn out for candidates he supports.

The area was crucial to Assemblymember Claire Valdez’s crushing 56-38 defeat of Brooklyn Borough President Antonio Reynoso.

“The factor that felt most significant to me were all of these New Yorkers who got activated and politicized in the mayor’s race last year who were looking for the next fight,” said Andrew Epstein, a political adviser to Mamdani who worked on Valdez’ campaign. “Those people didn’t go away. And they want to keep going.”

Valdez also won several heavily Latino areas that were expected to break for her opponent.

Reynoso was born in Brooklyn to Dominican parents and just a few years ago was a City Council member representing Bushwick, a long-gentrifying Brooklyn neighborhood that’s home to Latino families and young hipsters. Valdez was born in Texas, moved to New York City in 2015 and served in the state Assembly for just one term before launching her Mamdani-backed bid for retiring Rep. Nydia Velázquez’s seat.

She ended up winning areas of Bushwick by even greater margins than the total results — in some election districts winning upwards of 80 percent of the vote.

“You don’t win the district by 35 points if you don’t have broad advantages across age and demographic groups,” said Michael Lange, an election analyst and Mamdani supporter who has tracked several contested races with extreme granularity. “Is she blowing him out of the water with Hispanic voters under 50? I see tons of evidence that the answer is yes.”

The age advantage was the common thread across several other races.

In Upper Manhattan and the Bronx, for example, younger Black voters in Harlem were key to Darializa Avila Chevalier’s win over Rep. Adriano Espaillat, the chair of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus who had built a small political empire in the district.

While gentrifying, the neighborhood remains a seat of Black political power and is home to younger households who tend to rent. That particular demographic is a strong indicator of why Mamdani won the area in 2025, even as he lost the Black vote overall to former Gov. Andrew Cuomo, whose support was concentrated among older Black homeowners in Brooklyn and Queens.

While Espaillat never healed a rift with the Black community in upper Manhattan opened during his election in 2016, which contributed to his weak performance, Avila Chevalier demonstrated Tuesday that a significant share of voters there were not just supportive of Mamdani the person, but of the broader political movement he’s now leading.

Overall, she edged out Espaillat with Black voters 48-46, according to an analysis from The New York Times, which charted demographic breakdowns for several contested races.

Three winning congressional candidates endorsed by Mamdani — including former city Comptroller Brad Lander in Brooklyn, who unseated incumbent Dan Goldman — share several similarities. They won younger, college-educated and wealthier voters by huge margins, in several cases by 30 points or more, and lost lower-income voters to incumbents or candidates affiliated with incumbents — a sign that the movement seeking to boost struggling New Yorkers has not won them over.

While the DSA was able to win three state races without the support of Mamdani — a testament to the organizing prowess of the left that was essential to reactivating the mayor’s coalition — there were limits to the city’s leftward shift.

Rep. Grace Meng won her reelection race, though she only vanquished challenger Chuck Park by 14 points, an uncomfortable margin for an incumbent of her stature. Park, who ran to Meng’s left, was boosted by a huge turnout in Woodside, Queens, a multiethnic neighborhood that went heavily for Mamdani in last year’s mayoral race.

Elsewhere in the Bronx, however, incumbents remained strong. Rep. Ritchie Torres handily won reelection with 72 percent of the vote, though it was a low-turnout affair more consistent with an uncompetitive midterm. Nevertheless, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries touted the results — even as he watched a series of his endorsed candidates fall to the DSA in Brooklyn, his home borough, in a preview of the intraparty battles to come.

“In some higher-income districts, there was an outsized focus on the Middle East. In other districts, for instance, in the South Bronx, Ritchie Torres ran against somebody who was heavily critical of his position on Israel, and he won by fifty points,” Jeffries told MS NOW on Wednesday.