Hungry to End DHS Shutdown, Johnson Eats 'Crap Sandwich' Deal He Rejected Last Week
3 minute readPublished: Wednesday, April 1, 2026 at 11:42 pm
House and Senate Republicans on Wednesday announced a deal to advance a plan to fund the US Department of Homeland Security, which would end a partial DHS shutdown but deliberately punt the most contentious issuefunding for Immigration and Customs Enforcementfor a future reconciliation fight.Under the planwhich was rejected last week by House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) as a "crap sandwich"most DHS operations will be funded via regular spending bill while Republicans will attempt to fund President Donald Trumps deadly ICE crackdown via a two-step legislative process meant to thwart any potential Democrat filibuster.In the coming days, Republicans in the Senate and House will be following through on the president's directive by fully funding the entire Department of Homeland Security on two parallel tracks: through the appropriations process and through the reconciliation process," Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) and House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) said in a joint statement.REMINDER: The Senate unanimously passed BIPARTISAN legislation to fund all of DHS except ICE and Border Patrol. Speaker Johnson called that deal a joke, killed it, and sent Congress home for two weeks. And now hes apparently saying he wants that deal after all? Rep. Mike Levin (@levin.house.gov) April 1, 2026 at 1:59 PMThe deal would immediately restore pay for workers including Transportation Security Administration (TSA) agents. However, it excludes ICE and US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) which have been the subject of a tense partisan standoff over Trump's anti-immigrant blitz. The plan contains no restrictions on ICE, which Democrats sought in the wake of the killings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti, as well as a record surge in immigrant deaths in the agency's custody. For the last 47 days, Donald Trump and Republicans have subjected the nation to chaos at airports, jeopardized our national security, and kept the government closed to allow ICE to continue to brutalize the American people without consequence, House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY) said in response to the agreement. Through it all, House Democrats continue to stand up for the American people and aggressively push back against far-right extremism, he added. Mike Johnson and House Republicans have come to realize that we will never bend the knee.The DHS shutdown was the longest in history, according to The New York Times. Opponents of more funding for ICEwhich is flush with $75 billion in fresh allocations under last year's budget reconciliation packageweighed in on the deal."Todays announcement signals a clear recognition of what the public knows and believes: No additional funds are needed, given the shocking and stark realities and horrors already coming from an out-of-control immigration enforcement apparatus with $150 billion left to spend," FWD.us president Todd Schulte said in a statement, referring to the total amount of ICE and CBP funding under the One Big Beautiful Bill Act.All members of Congress should vote to pass the bill immediately to fund DHS without sending any more money to ICE and CBP and bring this self-created crisis and chaos to an end," Schulte continued. "Moving forward with a party-line, reconciliation process that would send hundreds of billions of dollars more to ICE and CBPon top of the $150 billion they already haveand seemingly pay for it with cuts to healthcare would be a terrible policy outcome," he added, "and one that would be met with massive, overwhelmingly public opposition.