Shutdown risk grows as Democrats revolt after Minneapolis shooting
By: Jordain Carney (POLTICO)
DISARM ICE!
That is the needed remedy. We really do need immigration laws enforce so ICE is necessary. But civil arrests and deportations are administrative functions and not criminal law enforcement. ICE agents do not need firearms to perform their duties. Disarming ICE still allows the agency to enforce immigration law.
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
Congress is on a path toward a partial government shutdown next week after Senate Democrats vowed to oppose Department of Homeland Security funding following the killing of a 37-year-old Minneapolis resident by federal agents Saturday.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said in a statement Saturday night that Democrats would not help advance the six-bill spending package set for consideration next week as long as it includes DHS funding. Republicans will need Democratic support in order to clear a 60-vote hurdle to advance the funding bill.
“Senate Democrats will not provide the votes to proceed to the appropriations bill if the DHS funding bill is included,” Schumer said, adding that he would personally vote “no.”
Congress has already passed full-year funding for some agencies — including the departments of Agriculture, Commerce, Interior and Justice — but not for several of the largest, including the Pentagon. Temporary funding for those departments, representing more than 75 percent of federal discretionary spending, expires midnight Friday.
Senate Democrats will hold a conference call Sunday evening, according to a Democratic aide granted anonymity to discuss the private meeting. The call will give them a chance to discuss next steps with the Senate stuck out of town until at least Tuesday because of the massive winter storm affecting much of the country.
Earlier in the day, as news of the Minneapolis shooting spread, several Democratic senators who had previously voted to advance government funding measures under President Donald Trump vowed to oppose DHS funding this time. Funding for ICE and Border Patrol, the agencies involved in the Minnesota operation, is included in the pending Senate bill.
“I am voting against any funding for DHS until and unless more controls are put in place to hold ICE accountable,” said Sen. Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii) in a statement Saturday. “These repeated incidents of violence across the country are unlawful, needlessly escalatory, and making all of us less safe.”
Schatz helped advance a funding bill in March, and Sens. Catherine Cortez Masto (D-Nev.) and Jacky Rosen (D-Nev.), who voted to end the 43-day shutdown in November, also both said Saturday that they will oppose the DHS funding bill.
“I have the responsibility to hold the Trump Administration accountable when I see abuses of power — like we are seeing from ICE right now,” Rosen said on X. “That is why I’ll be voting against any government funding package that contains the bill that funds this agency, until we have guardrails in place to curtail these abuses of power and ensure more accountability and transparency.”
The DHS bill passed the House Thursday 220-207, with only seven Democrats voting for it. But Republican House leaders merged it with five other bills funding the departments of Defense, Health and Human Services and State, among others, sending it to the Senate as one package.
More than half of the 47-member Democratic caucus has already vowed to oppose the package, many before Saturday’s shooting. And that number is growing as Democrats’ re-evaluate the legislation in the wake of the shooting and as they face pressure from House Democrats and their Senate colleagues, not to mention outside voices close to the party base.
Abdul El-Sayed, a Democratic candidate seeking a Senate seat in Michigan, said in an interview Saturday he saw no way for any Democrat to justify a vote for DHS funding.
“How many more people do they need to shoot?” he asked.
A group of senators, including Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) and Alex Padilla (D-Calif.), have been whipping colleagues for days to oppose the DHS bill, according to two aides granted anonymity to discuss their private effort. And two people familiar with the plans said House Democrats are scheduled to hold a private caucus call Sunday morning to discuss a response to the shooting.
Cortez Masto, in a statement, suggested dropping the Department of Homeland Security bill from the larger package, noting there is a “bipartisan agreement on 96% of the budget.”
“Let’s pass the remaining five bipartisan bills and fund essential agencies while we continue to fight for a Department of Homeland Security that respects Americans’ constitutional rights and preserves federal law enforcement’s essential role to keep us safe,” she said.
Sen. Jack Reed (D-R.I.) said he would agree to “immediately pass” the other five bills while providing “short term funding for DHS so the Senate can fully debate and vote on common sense reforms to ICE that bolster the rule of law.”
But stripping out the DHS bill before the Friday deadline would require every senator to agree — something Republicans aren’t likely to be able to get. Any changes to the package, meanwhile, will require sending it back to the House, which has already left town until after the shutdown deadline.
Instead, Republicans believe it’s up to Democrats to decide whether or not to vote against the funding package and avoid a partial shutdown. GOP leaders aren’t currently expected to bring the House back early from its break, according to three people granted anonymity to discuss internal strategy.
Democratic aides, meanwhile, privately acknowledged Saturday that the odds of a shutdown were rising, though some questioned what alternatives are available if Democrats block the pending six-bill package.
Heading into the weekend, some Democrats acknowledged they were conflicted — including Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.), a senior appropriator who has championed Congress’ ability to use the spending bills to reverse many of Trump’s foreign aid cuts.
“I don’t know the details of exactly what the language is in the Homeland Security bills in terms of trying to hold ICE accountable and trying to minimize their misconduct, and I don’t know whether it is worse to have a continuing resolution and how that might be misused,” Coons told reporters Friday.
Adam Wren, Meredith Lee Hill and Jennifer Scholtes contributed to this report.
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Leave it to Chuck Schumer to screw up in the worst possible way. Defunding ICE or Abolishing ICE are losing propositions that will only make Democrats look like bigger clowns than Donald Trump. Why do Democrats seem to always choose a strategy that is guaranteed to lose?
The proper course of action would be to demand that ICE be disarmed. Armed ICE agents have become a threat to public safety. Disarming ICE agents would neutralize that threat and still allow ICE to enforce immigration law.
Come on, Democrats, for once do the right thing the right way. Think about the country instead of the next election. Protect the people of the United States instead of protecting a political position for personal benefit.
Makes one wonder if they would rather have another shutdown they can try to blame on the Republicans.
The Minnesota delegation is exploring the possibility of disarming ICE agents. That would only require a revision of 8 U.S.C. § 1357. The text of the existing provision is:
The permissive text "may carry a firearm" indicates that the authority is optional and not a necessary component of performing duties. The law clearly indicates an understanding that ICE performing its duties does not depend upon being armed.
They've been murdered, had cars used to batter them, been shot at by terrorist groups and lone wolves and even had a finger bitten off.
Sure, taking away their guns will sold things.
We will see where this goes
How many ICE agents will have to be killed in order to get their guns back? Will people that shoot them be held accountable or live off their go fund me money?
Yes, taking guns away from ICE will prevent their misuse of firearms. Yes, it is a dangerous job but firearms will not make the job any safer. If guns are the answer then uphold the 2nd amendment rights of citizens.
How many private citizens must be killed before they are allowed to exercise their 2nd amendment rights?
As soon as cities let ice do their job
No other city in the country is having this problem.
Yet few seem to see the correlation.
Maybe trying peaceful protests whole ice does their job should be tried. If ice misbehaves go after them
If ICE can't do its job then why is Kristi Noem praising ICE for all the arrests? 3,000+ ICE arrests in six weeks doesn't sound like ICE has been obstructed.
If Walz and Frey back down and tell their loon base to back off, they will lose that loon base. Between them and Somalis, that is how they got elected. It's too late for them to do the right thing.....politically.
No other city in the US has 3,000+ armed Federal agents roaming the streets, either. Seems the Federal government is creating their own problem. Why is that?
Walz isn't running for reelection. Trump Republicans already won that meme war.
No one says they can't do their jobs. The problem is the idiots that get in the way, in their faces, assault them, etc. Because of them, extra ICE agents are needed for those that are conducting the operation are protected.
If Walz and Frey called off the losers, ICE would not need the extra manpower.
Unfortunately, many of the AWFULs can gone far over the deep end, so they will probably not stop even if they were told to.
Who says he won't get back on iif he thinks he won the ICE war?
I am sure his wife will miss the smell of smoke through their windows if he does not at least try again.
Notice the politicians in Mn are not joining their lemmings on the street.
They would rather have them out to die for them rather than they take a real stand and join the rest of the instigators.
Sounds like a bunch of cowards.
Have you been watching the news? They are arresting people in spite of illegal interference
You know....
If leftists gave an inkling of sorrow for the literal tens of thousands of Americans and legal migrants that have been killed, raped, assaulted, robbed, etc by the very illegal criminal aliens they fight to protect at every turn, MAYBE I will be a little more sympathetic to the instigators and insurrectionists that got themselves in the situation they got in, own their own, to get killed by ICE.
Kristi Noem said last night that President Trump prevented "hundreds of millions" of doses of deadly drugs from entering the US.
Does that sound right?
Who cares if it was one or hundreds of millions?
The fact is he has saved lives by preventing drugs from coming into this country at a far, far slower rate than Biden let in. Much better than the hundreds to thousands of lives that were taken by criminal illegals. The same criminal illegals leftists are going above and beyond to protect.
People who realize Kristi Noem is a pathological liar.