The Department of Homeland Security remained unfunded on Day 42 of its shutdown Friday after Congress passed two incompatible funding bills within hours of each other, guaranteeing the impasse will extend into a seventh week. The Senate passed its bill early Friday morning in a unanimous vote, funding the bulk of DHS through September but excluding Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Border Patrol. That exclusion was a concession to Senate Democrats who have demanded reforms to immigration enforcement following two officer-involved deaths of U.S. citizens in Minneapolis. The House then rejected that measure outright and, in a 213-203 party-line vote, passed its own eight-week stopgap that funds the entire department including ICE and Border Patrol through May 22. NPR and Roll Call confirmed both votes; Fox News covered the proceedings extensively.
House Speaker Mike Johnson dismissed the Senate bill immediately: "This gambit that was done last night is a joke." Senate Majority Leader John Thune blamed Democrats: "It is now clear to everyone that Democrats didn't actually want a solution, they wanted an issue." Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer fired back: "Senate Democrats stood united — no wavering, no backing down. We held the line." The Senate requires 60 votes to advance legislation, meaning the House bill needs Democratic support to proceed — support Schumer has already signaled will not come, leaving the shutdown without a resolution path as of Friday evening.
The human cost of the shutdown is mounting. TSA officer absences reached 40 percent at some airports, and more than 480 TSA officers have resigned since the shutdown began. President Trump partially bridged the gap Friday by signing a memo directing TSA employees to receive paychecks as soon as Monday, drawing on $75 billion in separate funds Congress had appropriated for immigration enforcement last summer. ICE has similarly remained operational throughout the shutdown using those separately appropriated funds — a detail confirmed by both NPR and Fox News, which complicates the Democratic argument that the Senate's exclusion of ICE funding was purely procedural.
The core dispute is over whether any DHS funding deal must include meaningful guardrails on immigration enforcement operations, including a ban on officers wearing face coverings during arrests. Republicans have rejected any conditions on ICE and Border Patrol as a poison pill. With both chambers having now formally passed bills unacceptable to the other, any resolution will require either House Republicans to accept a deal without full ICE funding, or Senate Democrats to drop their demand for enforcement reforms.
Left-Leaning Emphasis
- NPR and CNN focused on the humanitarian and operational stakes for TSA workers who have gone without pay for 42 days, framing the House GOP bill as an attempt to use the shutdown to fund immigration enforcement without addressing Democrats' concerns about deadly enforcement incidents.
- Left-leaning coverage emphasized that Senate Democrats' demands for guardrails on ICE stemmed from specific documented deaths of U.S. citizens, arguing the reforms are a legitimate public safety concern rather than obstruction.
Right-Leaning Emphasis
- Fox News framed Speaker Johnson's rejection of the Senate bill as a principled stand — Republicans were elected to fund the full border security apparatus and the Senate bill's exclusion of ICE funding reflects Democratic obstruction, not compromise.
- Right-leaning coverage highlighted that ICE and Border Patrol have continued to operate throughout the shutdown using separately appropriated funds, treating Democratic demands as a manufactured leverage point rather than a genuine policy priority.