Feb. 10 (UPI) — Democratic leaders in Congress have rejected Republicans’ counterproposal to fund the Department of Homeland Security, calling it “incomplete and insufficient.”
The disagreement comes amid negotiations over Congress’s appropriations bill for the DHS, specifically the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency. If an agreement can’t be made this week, it could result in a partial government shutdown.
Democrats issued a list of 10 reform demands in exchange for agreeing to the funding last week. They’ve taken issue with what they describe as aggressive tactics used by federal immigration officials that have resulted in the deaths of U.S. protesters in Minnesota last month.
Republicans, led by the White House, released their own counterproposal to the 10-point list. Though those details have not been made public, The Hill reported.
Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer and House Democratic leader Hakeem Jeffries, both of New York, issued a statement in response to the Republican counterproposal on Monday.
“Republicans shred an outline of a counterproposal, which included neither details nor legislative text,” the statement read. “The initial GOP response is both incomplete and insufficient in terms of addressing the concerns have about ICE’s lawless conduct.
“Democrats await additional detail and text.”
Among the Democrats’ proposed list of reforms were bans on immigration officers entering private property without a judicial warrant, indiscriminate arrests, agents wearing masks, racial profiling, and funds for enforcement near medical facilities, schools, child care centers, churches, polling stations and courts.
Other reforms include making into law a “reasonable” use-of-force policy, requiring DHS officers to display their identification, and the preservation of state and local jurisdictions’ ability to investigate and prosecute crimes and excessive-force incidents.
Body cameras must be worn and only used for accountability of immigration officers and not for tracking protesters, as well as regulations governing uniforms and equipment used by DHS officers to bar them from becoming a paramilitary force were also among the demands.
In an appearance on CNBC’s Squawk Box on Monday, Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wis., took issue with the Democrats’ demand for a judicial warrant to carry out certain activities instead of an administrative warrant issued by federal agency officials. He said such a requirement would be too much of a burden on the system.
“Our immigration laws have always been enforced by the executive branch, through administrative law judges,” Johnson said. “We have, again, literally millions of cases that need to be adjudicated. Our Article Three courts simply can’t handle that, and Democrats know it.”
The Transactional Records Access Clearing House, a data-gathering organization founded at Syracuse University, said there were 3.38 million cases in the U.S. immigration court backlog as of December. Since October, the beginning of fiscal year 2026, there have been 130,642 new cases in immigration courts, and 193,858 have been closed.
Of the new cases in fiscal year 2026, 1.64% — slightly more than 2,100 — have been based on alleged criminal activity other than illegal immigration, TRAC reported.
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