Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer is in the crosshairs once again as DHS funding is up next in the Senate to avert a government shutdown.
Chuck Schumer and Senate Democrats have released three major demands they want before they vote on the funding bills.
The three demands are reasonable by any standard, but they already part of ICE and CBP standards. So, why only three demands?
We have seen repeatedly how the Trump administration does not follow the rule of law. ICE has already violated dozens of court orders in Minnesota alone.
“ICE is not a law unto itself,” Schiltz said in a four-page order.
How will the Democrats get Republicans to enforce these rules?
Schumer wants to rein in ICE by ending the roving patrols, forcing accountability, removing masks and making sure body cams are turned on.
But how does he enforce this? Tom Homan can easily defend sending in scores of ICE agents to any city by claiming they are combating protesters, faux paid agitators and defending the safety of the agents.
For Item 2, the Supreme Court, lead by Brett Kavanaugh already gave ICE agents incredible latitude to do whatever the fuck they want.
Why isn't Schumer demanding budget cuts from ICE as part of his plan? Trump and Musk decimated the federal government with unwarranted insane cuts.
Instead of $10 billion, offer $2.5 billion and negotiate from there. The massive funding requirements is what is allowing Trump to form a Gestapo-like secret police force in the first place.
A useful comparison would be how Republicans responded to the surge in funding for the Internal Revenue Service in the Biden-era Inflation Reduction Act. The moment they got leverage, Republicans forced substantial reductions in that funding, despite a Democratic Senate and a Democratic President in 2023-24. They have continued this approach ever since, including another hack at IRS funding in the funding bill that passed the House just last week with bipartisan support. There is now only about $10 billion of that $80 billion surge left, and nearly nothing for enforcement of the tax laws, the whole point of the policy.
Yet where Republican nullification of the IRS money is seen as a fact of life, the $75 billion ICE surge in the One Big Beautiful Bill Act has been deemed untouchable by Democrats, at least in this round of asks.
Trump uses his ICE agents as a revenge squad against his political rivals or detractors.
Cut the funding so he can't wield them like a hammer.
The ideas Schumer is fighting for should already should already be enforced. He's almost reverse negotiating with himself.
Republicans need Democratic voters to pass these bills. The first vote failed when seven Republicans joined Democrats.
Schumer offering up only three requirements is already a losing proposition.
Karoli adds: That $75 billion could pay for all of the enhanced ACA subsidies for TEN YEARS. Let's not fund Trump's secret police and fund health care instead.
UPDATE:
