Have Dems Thrown in the Towel in Schumer Shutdown II: TSA Boogaloo? – HotAir

A funny thing happened on the way to the Forum airport. ICE agents showed up to alleviate the crisis caused by Chuck Schumer’s second shutdown of this Congress, and … everyone loved them. As David wrote earlier, the immigration officers manned security checkpoints so well and expeditiously that travelers embraced their presence … and demolished the Democrats’ attempts to paint them as “thugs” and “fascists.”

Suddenly, Senate Democrats want to play Monty Hall on the stalled funding package for the Department of Homeland Security. Multiple outlets report that a new deal will fund DHS, except for a slice of ICE’s migrant-removal operations. However, Republicans have a plan for that, and that may cost Democrats more than just a little face:

For the first time in more than a month, there’s optimism that the Senate and the White House can finally find a path to reopening the Department of Homeland Security. Key Senate Republicans returned from the White House late Monday with a noticeably upbeat demeanor over the state of the talks with President Donald Trump, who had just rebuffed a GOP-backed off-ramp.

The framework under discussion would fund all of DHS except for ICE’s migrant removal operations, and could eventually include some reforms that Democrats have been demanding.

Republicans would then try to fund the rest of ICE via a party-line reconciliation bill.

That strategy opens up another option, however:

GOP leaders would also try to use reconciliation to enact elements of the SAVE America Act, which mandates photo IDs and citizenship verification for federal elections. Trump has called this bill his top legislative priority.

That may not be the only GOP priority Trump will get past a filibuster. The Pentagon wants $200 billion in supplemental funding to deal with the conflict in Iran, which Democrats planned to block or make heavily conditional. Politico reports that Senate Republicans want to add that, too:

— THE GOP’S FOCUS: The reconciliation bill senators are pitching would be limited to ICE enforcement operations and — in a crucial concession to the president — portions of the SAVE America Act.

Trump agreed in the meeting to back off his demand to link the bills on the condition that SAVE provisions become part of the reconciliation push, two people granted anonymity to describe the meeting told Meredith Lee Hill.

Not much of the elections bill now on the Senate floor would comply with strict budget rules, but two people tell Jordain GOP senators are looking at providing federal funding to incentivize states to adopt voter ID requirements and other features of the bill.

Republicans might find it hard to stop there, however. Expect supplemental funding for the Iran war to come up as a potential costly add-on, and conservatives in the House have plenty of their own ideas, too.

The best part? Until Schumer shut down DHS, the appetite for another reconciliation bill and the lengthy fight it would uncork had been nearly non-existent. Politico reported separately that Republicans changed their mind, perhaps in part because of pressure from the White House:

Senate Majority Leader John Thune said in an interview Monday night that a brewing Homeland Security spending deal has lent new momentum to the push for another party-line bill. That bill would fund immigration enforcement — and potentially much more.

“If we end up going down that route, we’ll try and make the most of the opportunity,” he told POLITICO.

That’s a big tell from Thune, who up to now has been noncommittal on the idea of a second reconciliation bill this Congress. The idea also appears to have buy-in from President Donald Trump after a White House sales job Monday from GOP Sens. Katie Britt of Alabama, Steve Daines of Montana, Lindsey Graham of South Carolina and Bernie Moreno of Ohio.

The Schumer Shutdown II: TSA Boogaloo may not be the only reason Thune has grown more enthusiastic about reconciliation as an option. Trump has pushed hard to get Senate Republicans to eliminate the filibuster as a way to get the SAVE America Act passed, as well as to end the DHS shutdown. Thune doesn’t have the votes to end the filibuster, let alone the inclination. If Republicans can package this into a reconciliation bill, which requires elements to be at least somewhat budgetary in nature and deficit-neutral, then the filibuster doesn’t apply. Thune can pass it on a simple majority while preserving the filibuster … for now.

The question will be whether any reconciliation bill can pass at all, as well as whether the GOP can arrange for it to be deficit-neutral. If they push supplemental defense funding into the bill, they will have to reduce federal spending on a dollar-for-dollar basis to make that work, which is easy to do in theory but trickier in practice. Given the extremely narrow GOP majority in the House, it may be nearly impossible without treading on some pork interests. 

Speaking of which, the best strategy for getting this done would be to originate the bill in the Senate and present it to the House as a fait accompli. House Republicans will need to be part of the negotiations, but floor votes are so fraught at the moment for Speaker Mike Johnson that it may be best to let the Senate write the bill rather than slug it out in the House GOP caucus. 

On the other hand, maybe members of Congress are more motivated than we know to get this resolved:

NEWS that Congressional staff are not going to like- Delta is suspending its special congressional desk service for members of Congress until the shutdown is over. @ajc https://t.co/q2w4VIkK7p pic.twitter.com/sXnnZFOz4G

— Patricia Murphy (@MurphyAJC) March 24, 2026

Passing the DHS funding compromise would address this and the airport situation immediately. It may take longer to put together the reconciliation package, but Thune finally has the motivation and the momentum he needs to push it. Democrats once again overplayed their hand, and may end up with less than nothing as a result. 

Editor’s Note: After more than 40 days of screwing Americans in late 2025, a few Dems finally caved. The Schumer Shutdown was never about principle—just inflicting pain for political points. And now they’ve derailed American air travel with the Schumer Shutdown II: TSA Boogaloo, to score more political points on behalf of illegal alien criminals and open borders.