{"id":20898,"date":"2026-04-03T08:47:55","date_gmt":"2026-04-03T08:47:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/republicans-want-to-go-it-alone-on-ice-funding-it-might-be-a-slippery-slope\/"},"modified":"2026-04-03T08:47:55","modified_gmt":"2026-04-03T08:47:55","slug":"republicans-want-to-go-it-alone-on-ice-funding-it-might-be-a-slippery-slope","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/republicans-want-to-go-it-alone-on-ice-funding-it-might-be-a-slippery-slope\/","title":{"rendered":"Republicans want to go it alone on ICE funding. It might be a slippery slope."},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

If last year\u2019s Republican megabill served as Congress\u2019 gateway drug to party-line government funding, the GOP\u2019s latest spending plan makes clear it was habit-forming.<\/p>\n

Nine months ago, Republicans used the budget reconciliation process to skirt a Democratic filibuster and enact more than $280 billion for the Pentagon and the Department of Homeland Security. It shattered conventional wisdom on Capitol Hill that reconciliation\u2019s special power couldn\u2019t \u2014 and shouldn\u2019t \u2014 be used to circumvent the across-the-aisle work Congress does each year to fund federal agencies.<\/p>\n

Now President Donald Trump has given congressional Republicans until June 1<\/u><\/a> to fund Immigration and Customs Enforcement \u2014 an entire government agency \u2014 through a partisan process that won\u2019t require a single Democratic vote. Republicans are also mulling whether to fund a war in the Middle East that same way, with the White House considering a $200 billion request<\/u><\/a> for supplemental funding for the Pentagon.<\/p>\n

Republicans say this is happening because Democrats refuse to back a full Department of Homeland Security funding measure without adding guardrails on immigration enforcement activities the GOP finds intolerable, leading to the current record-breaking shutdown. Democrats also are unlikely to support giving the Trump administration additional dollars to bolster its military presence in Iran.<\/p>\n

\u201cDemocrats have put us where we are, and we have to deal with it,\u201d Sen. John Hoeven of North Dakota, a senior Republican on the Senate Appropriations Committee, told reporters Monday. \u201cWe don\u2019t have a choice.\u201d<\/p>\n

But Hoeven also acknowledged it could be a slippery slope. Asked whether he was worried about setting a new precedent, he conceded, \u201cMe, as an appropriator? Yeah.\u201d<\/p>\n

Democrats previously used their own party-line bills during the Biden administration to fund programs opposed by Republicans, such as an $80 billion infusion for IRS tax enforcement. But that was in addition to the funding agencies received through regular appropriations, not as a substitute for it.<\/p>\n

Democrats are pushing back on the idea they are responsible for the GOP\u2019s go-it-alone approach \u2014 and they are warning about dire consequences.<\/p>\n

Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.), a senior appropriator, said it would be \u201ca tragic mistake\u201d for Republicans to bankroll a war while sidelining their minority party colleagues.<\/p>\n

Enacting funding through reconciliation, Coons said, \u201crequires no compromise with the other party. And if that becomes the sole way we fund the core functions of government, that is a bad idea.\u201d<\/p>\n

Senate Majority Leader John Thune suggested Thursday that the fallout from the current funding fight could have long-term implications, warning that it’s \u201cnot good for the country or for the future of the appropriations process or, for that matter, the future of the Senate.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s just the latest blow to bipartisan norms of the congressional appropriations process during Trump\u2019s second term. White House budget director Russ Vought has executed a playbook<\/u><\/a> for undercutting cross-party funding negotiations, and Republican leaders have gone along with those tactics, including the stopgap funding patch that riled Democrats last spring<\/u><\/a> and the enactment of a clawbacks package<\/u><\/a> last summer that canceled billions of dollars Congress previously cleared with bipartisan support.<\/p>\n

Many Republicans aren\u2019t happy with how the latest step is unfolding, with top GOP appropriators especially concerned about funding a war effort without Democratic buy-in.<\/p>\n

\u201cI would prefer not to,\u201d House Appropriations Chair Tom Cole (R-Okla.) said late last month about clearing an emergency military package through the party-line process. But, he added, \u201cwe\u2019ll wait and see. A lot of that depends on what the Democrats want to do.\u201d<\/p>\n

Three Hill Republican aides, granted anonymity to speak candidly, privately forecasted that the current funding breakdown will fuel a tit-for-tat future for the appropriations process. The worry is that Republican presidents will routinely be forced to use reconciliation to clear immigration enforcement funding through Congress, and Democratic presidents will have to use it to fund nondefense efforts GOP leaders are less keen on boosting.<\/p>\n

Republicans are now exploring enacting immigration enforcement funding for the remainder of Trump\u2019s presidency \u2014 not just the current fiscal year.<\/p>\n

Rep. Henry Cuellar of Texas, the top Democrat on the Homeland Security funding panel, said a future Congress under Democratic control could follow the GOP\u2019s example and use reconciliation to fund agencies such as the Environmental Protection Agency or the Department of Health and Human Services.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo I certainly have concerns with a bad precedent that they will be setting,\u201d Cuellar said in an interview Thursday.<\/p>\n

Matt Glassman, a senior fellow at Georgetown University\u2019s Government Affairs Institute, said \u201cthe big deal here\u201d is \u201cshoving the dysfunctional discretionary stuff into reconciliation.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cBecause of the ability to do party-line legislating in the reconciliation bills, it allows a back door to party-line discretionary appropriating,\u201d he said in an interview.<\/p>\n

Glassman also sees the creeping use of reconciliation as a way to sidestep mutually negotiated guardrails on spending. Limitations on use of money, and how much time agencies have to spend it, are longtime hallmarks of bipartisan funding negotiations.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf you throw money into these bills, then you lose sort of the control aspect that they love to put into the appropriations with the limitation provisions,\u201d Glassman said.<\/p>\n

Senate Appropriations Chair Susan Collins (R-Maine) said last week that Democrats\u2019 refusal to fund the Border Patrol or ICE without major policy changes \u201csets a precedent that they may one day come to regret.\u201d<\/p>\n

Other senior congressional appropriators contend that the bipartisan agreements Collins helped broker in recent months are proof that the annual funding process is working and that reconciliation is not a workable alternative. Despite the DHS drama, Congress managed to approve more than $1.6 trillion<\/u><\/a> for every other federal department following a 43-day government shutdown<\/u><\/a> last fall.<\/p>\n

Connecticut Rep. Rosa DeLauro, the House\u2019s leading Democratic appropriator, said in a statement this week that \u201creconciliation will never be a substitute for the appropriations process.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cRepublicans must realize our country is safer and stronger when government funding decisions are made by both Democrats and Republicans in the House and in the Senate,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n

Riley Rogerson contributed to this report.<\/i><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

If last year\u2019s Republican megabill served as Congress\u2019 gateway drug to party-line government funding, the GOP\u2019s latest spending plan makes clear it was habit-forming. Nine months ago, Republicans used the budget reconciliation process to skirt a Democratic filibuster and enact more than $280 billion for the Pentagon and the Department of Homeland Security. It shattered […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-20898","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-congress"],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20898","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=20898"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/20898\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=20898"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=20898"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=20898"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}