A presidential pardon of Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell would not end Sen. Thom Tillis’ one-man blockade of central bank nominees, the North Carolina Republican said Tuesday.

Only the Justice Department resolving its investigation into Powell’s Senate testimony on a massive Fed renovation project would suffice, he added, doubling down on his intention to use his vote on the Senate Banking Committee as a bulwark against any attempt to dilute the bank’s independence.

Tillis is the main obstacle to the swift confirmation of Kevin Warsh, President Donald Trump’s nominee to replace Powell as Fed chair. He has vowed to oppose any Fed nominee until the Powell investigation ends.

A pardon could be a fast and definitive way for Trump to end any legal peril for Powell, but Tillis called the idea “silly” and a “mistake” because it could imply that Powell is guilty of committing perjury during his appearance last year before the Banking Committee.

“A pardon to me almost validates the whole notion for the investigation,” Tillis said. “If they think they’ve got a valid case, then we’ll just see it through to the end.”

With Republicans holding a 13-11 majority on the Banking panel, Tillis’ opposition is enough to prevent Warsh from getting advanced out of committee unless he gets support from Democrats on the panel.

Tillis said Tuesday that he thought Warsh would be a “fine” Fed chair “at some point in the future if not this Congress, then the next Congress, if they don’t get this investigation done.”

“I’m not budging one inch,” he added. “This is foundational to Fed independence and if you reward this sort of behavior and there’s no compelling evidence that could convince me or a jury that he’s guilty of it then you’ve got to stand on Fed independence.”

Trump batted down a question Monday about whether he would ask prosecutors to drop the Powell case in order to clear a path for Warsh. He instead told reporters that Jeanine Pirro, the U.S. attorney for D.C., would “take it to the end and see.”

Responding to Trump’s remarks, Tillis said it showed “an area where we’re in agreement this week — we’re both willing to go all the way.”

Congress approved a spending package Tuesday afternoon that secures funding for the vast majority of federal agencies through September, ending the second government shutdown in the span of four months.

But what’s left unfinished — funding for the Department of Homeland Security — will be a doozy, with partisan tensions over President Donald Trump’s immigration enforcement agenda threatening another lapse for the embattled department that also includes TSA, FEMA and other crucial agencies.

The package the House passed in a bipartisan 217-214 vote Tuesday afternoon only funds DHS through next week. Democrats are refusing to support months of additional cash until Republicans agree to rein in the actions of ICE and Border Patrol agents following the fatal shootings last month of two U.S. citizens in Minnesota.

If Republicans don’t concede to enacting significant new mandates for DHS by the new Feb. 13 deadline, the department many Democrats have called “rogue” will face another funding lapse or short-term patch.

“We have a list that we want done, and we aren’t settling for half-measures,” Rep. Pete Aguilar (D-Calif.), the No. 3 party leader, told reporters Tuesday. He warned that if Senate Majority Leader John Thune and Speaker Mike Johnson “don’t want to come to the table and negotiate real reform, then they’re going to have to explain to the American public why they’re shutting down agencies.”

Trump is expected to swiftly sign the legislation, ending the partial government shutdown that began early Saturday morning after the Senate passed the altered package, punting the measure back to the House.

By advancing the trillion-dollar package, Congress has approved more than 95 percent of the government funding it approves each year to run federal agencies, after clearing full funding for some agencies in November and another slate in January.

Under the legislation that now awaits the president’s signature, the Pentagon and all remaining domestic agencies besides DHS will get new funding levels through the end of the fiscal year, which started with the longest government shutdown in U.S. history.

“We finalized true, bipartisan, bicameral bills to fully fund our government in a member driven, district focused way,” House Appropriations Chair Tom Cole (R-Okla.) said on the House floor. “Funding the government is not an optional exercise. It’s the most basic duty we have in Congress.”

Only 21 Democrats voted yes on passage, highlighting the challenge leaders face over the next 10 days in negotiating new immigration enforcement rules that can attract enough Democratic support for funding DHS into the fall.

“I refuse to send another cent to Stephen Miller or Kristi Noem,” Rep. Jim McGovern (D-Mass.) said this week. “They are undermining our Constitution, and the department they run is murdering American citizens in the streets.”

To ensure Democratic leaders on both sides of the Capitol are aligned heading into negotiations with Republicans over changes to DHS immigration operations, Jeffries is set to meet Tuesday afternoon with Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer.

House Democrats are demanding that Jeffries have a seat at the bargaining table after many groused this week about the altered funding package Senate Democrats brokered with the White House.

“They need to talk to Hakeem — the House and Senate are equal partners,” Rep. Debbie Dingell (D-Mich.) said in an interview.

House Democrats contend that they have a better understanding of Trump’s immigration enforcement actions in communities throughout the country, as well as the sentiment of Americans.

“We are the ones that are closest to the anger and the frustration of our constituents,” Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.) said in an interview. “We need [Senate Democrats] to start negotiating with us and carrying out our demands instead of constantly caving to Republicans.”

A spending package that would fund the vast majority of the federal government cleared a key procedural vote Tuesday, setting up votes later in the day to send the measure to the White House for President Donald Trump’s signature.

Final passage of the measure, which also includes a funding patch for the Department of Homeland Security through Feb. 13, would end the partial government shutdown that began Saturday.

Republicans stayed mostly united on the 217-215 test vote to advance the package that would fund the Pentagon and departments of Health and Human Services, Labor, Housing and Urban Development, Transportation, and Education through Sept. 30 and less than two weeks of funding for Homeland Security Department.

The short-term DHS funding is intended to give lawmakers time to negotiate reforms to how ICE and CBP officers execute the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement crackdown, with the hope of tamping down instances where federal officers have killed U.S. citizens. Republicans have their own demands, such as blocking federal funding on “sanctuary cities” that don’t cooperate with federal enforcement agencies.

The largely unified GOP vote came on the heels of a White House whip operation that headed off a handful of defections from within Speaker Mike Johnson’s party. Trump’s call for there to be no changes to the package in the House helped quell an effort from hard-line conservatives to attach a partisan elections bill, known as the SAVE Act, to the rule.

Speaker Mike Johnson, Majority Whip Tom Emmer and Majority Leader Steve Scalise also did some personal whipping on the House floor during the vote series, circulating between some of the most hard-line members of the Republican Conference in the leadup to and during the rule vote. It was a nail-biter for the leaders, with the vote held open for nearly an hour as they tried to bring their GOP colleagues in line.

Final passage of the Senate-passed $1.2 trillion funding package is expected Tuesday afternoon on a bipartisan vote.