House Speaker Mike Johnson has made a significant reversal in the effort to end the record-breaking 47-day partial government shutdown after announcing that he will work with Senate Majority Leader John Thune to pass a Department of Homeland Security (DHS) funding bill he had dismissed as a “joke” just days earlier.
On Wednesday, April 1, Johnson and Thune issued a joint statement on X outlining a two-track plan to reopen DHS. The two leaders said that the House will move to pass the Senate-approved bill that funds most of the department, except Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and parts of Customs and Border Protection (CBP).
At the same time, Republicans will pursue reconciliation to secure funding for ICE and CBP separately, a process that allows passage with a simple majority in the Senate.
“We appreciate and share the President’s determination to once and for all bring an end to the Democrat DHS shutdown,” Johnson wrote in his statement with Thune
“In the coming days, Republicans in the Senate and House will be following through on the President’s directive by fully funding the entire Department of Homeland Security on two parallel tracks: through the appropriations process and through the reconciliation process.”
Johnson emphasized that the plan would ensure federal workers are paid and that immigration enforcement and border security would be funded for the next three years.
Speaker Johnson issues a joint statement
He accused Democrats of placing “allegiance to their radical left-wing base above all else — including their own power of the purse — which means open borders and protecting criminal illegal aliens.” The Senate passed the DHS funding bill at 2:18 a.m. on March 27, just before adjourning for a two-week Easter recess.
Only five senators were present: Majority Leader Thune; Republican Sens. Eric Schmitt and Bernie Moreno; and Democratic Sens. Brian Schatz and Andy Kim. None objected, allowing the measure to pass by unanimous consent.
The legislation funds DHS agencies such as the Coast Guard, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), and the Transportation Security Administration (TSA), but excludes ICE and portions of CBP.
The exclusion followed Democratic demands for stricter requirements on immigration enforcement after violent incidents in Minneapolis earlier this year.
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Speaker Johnson had sharply criticized the Senate-passed bill last Friday, calling it a “gambit” and “joke.”
“I’m quite convinced that it can’t be that every Senate Republican read the language of this bill,” he said at the time.
Instead, he proposed a short-term continuing resolution to fund the entire DHS for 60 days, including ICE and CBP, but the measure failed to gain traction in the Senate.
The shutdown, the longest partial closure in U.S. history, left TSA agents working without pay and caused long lines at airports nationwide.
President Donald Trump intervened on March 27, ordering DHS Secretary Markwayne Mullin to pay TSA agents to alleviate the crisis.
Conservative pushback
Johnson’s reversal has already drawn criticism from conservative Republicans. Rep. Keith Self of Texas, a member of the House Freedom Caucus, warned against separating ICE and CBP funding from DHS. “Funding for ICE and CBP must never be separated from DHS funding,” Self wrote on X.
“If Republicans isolate it, they’re handing our border and ICE agents straight to the radicals who will defund and dismantle them every chance they get.” Self added: “Fund DHS fully, or the open borders globalists win.”
Johnson and Thune defended their approach as necessary to reopen DHS while ensuring immigration enforcement funding is insulated from future Democratic attempts to restrict it.
“We operated under a belief that while our country is in the midst of an international armed conflict, Democrats might finally come to their senses and understand that defunding our homeland security agencies is beyond reckless and very dangerous,” they wrote.
They argued that the reconciliation process, already initiated by Sen. Lindsey Graham and the Senate Budget Committee, would guarantee funding for ICE and CBP for the remainder of the Trump administration.
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The partial shutdown began in mid-February after Congress failed to agree on DHS appropriations. Democrats demanded new restrictions on ICE operations, including requirements for judicial warrants to enter private property and limits on agents’ use of masks.
Republicans rejected those demands, leading to a stalemate that left DHS partially unfunded for more than six weeks.
The shutdown’s impact was felt most acutely at airports, where TSA agents worked without pay. Some quit or called in sick, leading to hours-long security lines.
President Trump’s directive to pay TSA agents temporarily eased the crisis, but broader DHS operations remained unfunded until the Senate’s early morning vote.
With Johnson’s reversal, the House is expected to take up the Senate-passed bill in the coming days. If approved, DHS would be reopened, and federal workers would receive back pay.
Republicans would then move to secure funding for ICE and CBP through reconciliation, setting up another partisan battle in the weeks ahead.
