The Deal to Split DHS: Inside the Senate's Plan to Fund Homeland Security While Starving ICE Enforcement

Six weeks into a partial government shutdown that has left airport security lines stretching past three hours and 50,000 TSA officers working without pay, Senate negotiators are converging on a solution that would cleave one of the federal government's largest departments in two: fund the parts that keep airports running and disasters managed, but strip out the immigration enforcement apparatus that triggered the standoff in the first place.

The emerging deal represents a political compromise with few precedents in American governance—selectively defunding a federal law enforcement operation while leaving the underlying statutes fully intact.

The Architecture of the Deal

The proposal taking shape in the Senate would fund the bulk of the Department of Homeland Security's $64.4 billion discretionary budget, covering the Transportation Security Administration, Customs and Border Protection, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the U.S. Coast Guard, the Secret Service, and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency [1][2]. It would also fund ICE's Homeland Security Investigations division, the arm responsible for counter-terrorism, human trafficking, child exploitation, and transnational crime investigations [3].

What it would exclude: ICE's Enforcement and Removal Operations (ERO), the division that carries out immigration arrests, manages the detention system, and conducts deportation flights. ERO's annual appropriation runs approximately $3.8 billion to $4.2 billion, though the Trump administration's FY2026 request sought significant increases including $501 million more for detention capacity and $205 million more for transportation and removal operations [4][5].

Under the package being floated, CBP would receive funding but with new guardrails requiring officers to serve in their traditional border roles rather than participating in interior immigration enforcement operations in cities. The deal would also mandate that immigration officers wear body cameras and identification—a key Democratic demand [2].

Republicans would then pursue ICE enforcement funding through budget reconciliation, a procedural maneuver requiring only 51 Senate votes rather than the standard 60-vote threshold [3]. President Trump reportedly signaled support for this two-track approach during a Monday evening White House meeting with Republican senators [6].

The $85 Billion Question

The budget math underlying this debate is more complex than a simple line-item dispute. ICE currently has access to approximately $85 billion in total funding. Beyond its roughly $10 billion annual base budget, Congress granted ICE a $75 billion supplemental allocation under the 2025 reconciliation law, spendable over up to four years. If spent at a steady pace alongside annual appropriations, ICE would have nearly $29 billion available per year—making it, as Brennan Center analyst Lauren-Brooke Eisen noted, "larger than the annual budget of all other federal law enforcement agencies combined" [7].

Source: DHS Budget in Brief / NPR / Congressional Appropriations

Data as of Mar 24, 2026CSV

This means the bipartisan deal's exclusion of ERO from the regular appropriations bill does not necessarily leave enforcement unfunded entirely. Republicans argue the reconciliation track would restore those dollars within weeks. Democrats counter that the pause creates needed leverage to impose oversight reforms on an agency they say has operated with inadequate accountability.

Who Is in ICE Detention—And What Happens to Them

The fate of tens of thousands of people currently held in ICE facilities sits at the center of this debate. As of early 2026, ICE's detained population reached approximately 73,000—the highest level in the agency's 23-year history, an 84% increase from January 2025 [8]. The Trump administration has publicly targeted expanding capacity to 100,000 beds.

The composition of that population is fiercely contested. According to data analyzed by the Cato Institute, 73% of those in ICE detention as of February 2026 had no criminal conviction. Only 5% had a conviction for a violent offense, and 8% had a violent or property crime conviction [9]. The growth in detention has been driven overwhelmingly by individuals without criminal records: a 2,500% increase in non-criminal detainees arrested by ICE between January 2025 and January 2026, compared to an 80-243% increase in arrests of individuals with criminal records [8].

Source: Cato Institute / ICE Detention Data (Feb 2026)

Data as of Feb 7, 2026CSV

DHS has pushed back on these figures, stating that "70% of those arrested by ICE under the second Trump administration" have criminal charges or convictions [8]. The discrepancy stems partly from the difference between arrest statistics and the current detained population, and partly from whether pending charges (as opposed to convictions) are counted.

If ERO funding lapses, the immediate operational question is what happens to these 73,000 detainees. Legal experts say ICE cannot simply open the doors. Federal law requires detention of certain categories of immigrants, particularly those with criminal convictions or pending removal orders. A funding gap would more likely result in a freeze on new arrests and a triage system prioritizing detention of those with serious criminal records while releasing lower-priority detainees on alternatives to detention.

Those alternatives are significantly cheaper. Taxpayers currently pay approximately $152 per day per immigration detainee. Case management alternatives cost as little as $4 per day and have achieved "nearly perfect compliance"—99% appointment attendance and 100% court appearance rates, according to the Brennan Center [10].

Constitutional Questions and Legal Precedents

The deal raises a question with limited precedent: Can Congress effectively defund enforcement of existing statutory law while leaving that law on the books?

Federal courts have generally held that Congress controls the power of the purse and can choose not to fund particular programs. But the executive branch also has obligations under the Immigration and Nationality Act to enforce immigration law. The tension between these principles has not been definitively resolved.

What federal courts have addressed more directly is ICE's record of constitutional violations in carrying out its current operations. In the landmark case Gonzalez v. ICE, a federal district court ruled in 2019 that ICE's practice of issuing detainers based solely on electronic database checks of a person's birthplace—without independent probable cause—violated the Fourth Amendment. The court issued a permanent injunction blocking this practice [11].

More recently, after the ACLU challenged immigration sweeps in Los Angeles, a federal judge found the operations likely violated the Constitution's prohibition on unreasonable searches and issued a preliminary injunction [12]. In Minnesota, the ACLU filed a class-action lawsuit alleging ICE and CBP agents conducted "suspicionless stops, warrantless arrests, and racial profiling" [13].

When Citizens Get Caught in the Net

ProPublica documented more than 170 U.S. citizens held against their will by immigration agents during the first nine months of Trump's second administration—a count the outlet acknowledged is "almost certainly incomplete" [14]. Nearly 20 children were among those detained, including two with cancer.

The cases follow a disturbing pattern. Leonardo Garcia Venegas, a U.S. citizen in Alabama, was detained twice at construction sites despite presenting a valid REAL ID. Agents dismissed his identification as "fake" [14]. George Retes, a military veteran and U.S. citizen in California, was held for three days without phone contact after a raid; his family located him through a TikTok video [14]. A 79-year-old car wash owner was tackled and held for 12 hours with broken ribs and no medical care [14].

Historical data from the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse found that ICE wrongly identified at least 2,840 U.S. citizens as potentially eligible for removal between 2002 and 2017, with at least 214 taken into custody and an estimated 70 actually deported [15]. Extrapolating from academic research suggesting 1% of immigration detainees are citizens, the American Immigration Council estimated over 2,000 American citizens may be held by ICE annually at current detention levels [10][15].

The government does not systematically track citizen detentions by immigration agents. The administration has also reduced the capacity of the office responsible for investigating agent abuse allegations [14].

The Political Mechanics

The deal's emergence followed weeks of escalating political pressure driven by the TSA crisis. Airport callout rates spiked nationwide, reaching 55% at Houston Hobby International Airport on March 14 [16]. A TSA official warned that some smaller airports might have to "quite literally shut down" if the shutdown continued [17]. ICE agents were deployed to 13 airports to assist with security screening—an image that underscored the operational absurdity of the standoff [18].

Sen. Katie Britt of Alabama, who chairs the Homeland Security Appropriations Subcommittee, emerged as a chief Republican negotiator. After a Monday night White House meeting, she said she planned to work "through the night" to finalize language [6]. Sen. Susan Collins, the Appropriations Committee chair, expressed optimism that a deal could pass "by the end of the week" [3].

Four Republican senators—Steve Daines, Katie Britt, Lindsey Graham, and Bernie Moreno—led the White House negotiations. On the Democratic side, Sen. Patty Murray, the Appropriations ranking member, and Sen. Christopher Murphy, the top Democrat on the Homeland Security subcommittee, have been central to talks [3].

The confirmation of Markwayne Mullin as the new DHS Secretary on Monday, 54-45, with votes from Democrats Martin Heinrich of New Mexico and John Fetterman of Pennsylvania, may have eased negotiations. Even senators who voted against Mullin acknowledged he would be a more reliable negotiating partner than his predecessor, the ousted Kristi Noem [6].

Murray signaled the deal was not yet done: "I have not seen the language, and I don't agree to anything till I see the language" [3]. The reconciliation pathway for ICE funding faces its own hurdles—House Republicans hold narrow margins that make any floor vote uncertain.

What Happens to ICE's Other Work

A key concern raised by critics of the deal is the fate of ICE functions beyond deportation. ICE's Homeland Security Investigations division—which would be funded under the deal—investigates terrorism, narcotics smuggling, transnational gang activity, human trafficking, child exploitation, cybercrime, intellectual property theft, and money laundering [19]. HSI employs thousands of agents and operates in over 50 countries.

The deal's structure explicitly preserves HSI funding, addressing what would otherwise be a significant gap in federal criminal investigations. However, ERO also performs functions beyond immigration arrests. ERO manages the Criminal Alien Program, which screens incarcerated individuals in jails and prisons for immigration violations, and coordinates with local law enforcement on detainers. If ERO funding lapses, these programs would be affected alongside the more visible deportation operations [5].

E-Verify, the electronic employment verification system used by millions of employers, is administered by U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), not ICE, and would not be directly affected by the deal [19].

The View From the Border

The deal's reception among border-state senators has been mixed. Republican border-state senators face particular cross-pressures: their constituents often support robust border enforcement, but also feel the effects of a DHS shutdown acutely. Arizona and Texas communities depend on CBP operations that the deal would restore.

Sen. John Cornyn of Texas has been involved in broader shutdown discussions. The deal's inclusion of CBP funding with guardrails—keeping border officers at the border rather than deployed to interior operations—addresses a complaint shared by some border-state lawmakers from both parties who argue the administration has diverted border resources to conduct city-based immigration sweeps [2].

Democrats from border states, including Heinrich's vote for Mullin, suggest some willingness to engage on compromise. But the fundamental divide remains: Republicans view ERO as essential to enforcing existing law, while Democrats argue the agency has expanded far beyond its mandate, detaining tens of thousands of people without criminal records at enormous cost while repeatedly violating the constitutional rights of citizens and noncitizens alike.

What Comes Next

The deal, if finalized, would immediately restore pay to 50,000 TSA officers and fund FEMA, the Coast Guard, and other DHS agencies that have operated without appropriations since February 14. The reconciliation track for ICE enforcement funding would take longer—likely weeks or months—during which ERO operations would depend on the $75 billion supplemental fund already available to the agency [7].

The question is whether that supplemental money can legally be used for the same purposes as annual appropriations, or whether spending restrictions limit its application. Congressional budget experts are divided on this point, and litigation is possible regardless of which path the deal takes.

What is not in dispute is the political reality that produced this moment: a six-week shutdown that made the immigration enforcement debate tangible for millions of Americans waiting in airport security lines, and a Senate that concluded the only way out was to separate what most people agree on—funding airport security and disaster response—from what they do not.

Source: Brennan Center for Justice

Data as of Mar 24, 2026CSV