The Senate once again passed their DHS funding bill without any funding for the support staff at ICE and CBP, via unanimous consent, and sent it to the House. The House in turn convened this morning in a pro forma session, but did not take any action on it. The shutdown continues.
But the House will soon pass the partial funding bill and then, via reconciliation, fund all of DHS, including ICE and CBP. At least that’s the new plan.
But that process will take a while. So how do all these support staffers at ICE and CBP, who haven’t been paid since February, get paid in the meantime?
Fox News reporter Bill Melugin just revealed that they’ll be paid via the OBBB:
According to a memo that OMB sent to Congress, it appears the White House plans to take “additional executive action” to pay civilian support employees at ICE & CBP via the OBBB since they aren’t being paid now and won’t be paid through appropriations because the Senate DHS bill Republicans are agreeing to provides no funding for ICE & CBP.
It appears the WH intends to get those support employees paid via OBBB so they don’t want to wait until June for a reconciliation bill.
They haven’t been paid since mid February.
According to a memo that OMB sent to Congress, it appears the White House plans to take “additional executive action” to pay civilian support employees at ICE & CBP via the OBBB since they aren’t being paid now and won’t be paid through appropriations because the Senate DHS bill… pic.twitter.com/fnrjOsM9do
— Bill Melugin (@BillMelugin_) April 2, 2026
Melugin also weighs in on what was accomplished through all of this:
The reason Democrats started what is now the longest shutdown in DHS history is because they were demanding dramatic reforms to the way ICE operates.
They now get zero of those reforms after negotiations fell apart in the Senate. None.
Dems are claiming victory because Republicans are now agreeing to a DHS funding bill with zero dollars for ICE & CBP and Dems can message to their base that they held the line and didn’t fund Trump’s mass deportation agenda.
But ICE & CBP are already pre-funded (not entirely) by the One Big Beautiful Bill, immigration enforcement operations have continued without issue, and Republicans plan to give ICE & CBP even more money in a second reconciliation bill, which will require no Democratic votes in the Senate.
So what did this DHS shutdown accomplish, other than hurt a lot of people & create chaos at airports?
Exactly. All Democrats did was cause pain, with getting nothing in return. But it will be hailed by the garbage media as Democrats winning, which is just another false narrative.