The United States House of Representatives voted on Tuesday to reopen major parts of the federal government, sparking a confrontation between the White House and Senate Democrats over immigration enforcement practices. The legislation, which passed 217-214 with 21 Republicans opposing and 21 Democrats supporting, was swiftly signed into law by President Donald Trump.
The bill funds the Departments of Defense, Health and Human Services, Labor, Housing and Urban Development, Education and Transportation for the remainder of the fiscal year. However, the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Protection (CBP), will only receive funding for two weeks. Democrats intend to use this period to negotiate reforms following the fatal shootings of Renee Good by ICE officer Jonathan Ross and Alex Pretti by CBP officials in Minneapolis last month. Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem called Pretti a domestic terrorist, prompting some Republicans to call for her resignation. The killings and government response have led to protests and demands for changes to Trump’s deportation policies.
Many Democrats, including Representative Angie Craig of Minnesota, opposed the funding. “Look, we need to put guardrails in place. But short of Kristi Noem’s ICE getting the hell out of Minnesota, I'm not voting for a damn penny to ICE,” Craig told The Independent. She recounted that her Latino brother-in-law was surrounded by ICE agents simply because of his ethnicity. President Trump had deployed ICE to Minneapolis following a welfare fraud scandal involving Somali-Americans, but the operation has also resulted in the detention of US citizens and legal residents.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer has demanded an end to roving patrols in cities, removal of masks for ICE and CBP agents, and mandatory body cameras. House Speaker Mike Johnson pushed back on the mask issue, arguing that ICE agents are doxxed and targeted. White House border czar Tom Homan, sent to Minneapolis, reportedly told Schumer that unmasking agents would put them and their families at risk, and that many complaints would be rendered moot once he was in charge.
Even if the government had shut down, ICE would retain operational capacity due to $75 billion allocated in the “One Big, Beautiful Bill” signed by Trump last year. Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York stated that Democrats’ next task is to “claw back what has essentially supercharged this agency into a relentless domestic paramilitary.”
