Key House Republican Expects Homeland Security to Shut Down

The chairman of the House panel that oversees spending said he would be surprised if lawmakers reach a deal to fund the Department of Homeland Security past the end of the week, as lawmakers square off over immigration policy changes.

“This will be the third shutdown in four months, all of them happening in the Senate, all of them because of the filibuster, which almost every Democrat has condemned as a terrible rule that should never be used,” Appropriations Chairman Tom Cole (R-Okla.) said Tuesday. President Donald Trump and some Republicans have been pushing for a change to the Senate’s filibuster rule, which sets a 60-vote threshold to advance legislation, but Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) has been reluctant to scrap it.

Senate Republican leaders plan to propose a short-term stopgap to fund DHS beyond Friday’s deadline as both parties seek a more complete deal on immigration. Democrats are reluctant to give the department any more money without major policy changes after federal agents killed two US citizens in Minneapolis.

Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) said he’ll meet with Thune in a couple of hours to discuss DHS funding.

Cole said he would support any effort to extend DHS funding, but called a two-week continuing resolution — which may be easier to sell to Democrats than a longer stopgap — “stupid,” given the House is slated to be out of session next week. The Appropriations chairman said the speaker would likely cancel next week’s recess “if he thought there was any prospect of a deal,” but panned a lack of progress in the Senate.