Much of the Department of Homeland Security is likely to run out of money on Friday, caught in an impasse between Senate Democrats determined to put guardrails on the department’s immigration agents and Republicans insistent on giving agents a free hand.
From the streets of Minneapolis to the far suburbs of the Twin Cities, the looming shutdown is not hard to fathom. The senators are merely reflecting their voters.
“They need to completely defund ICE and Border Patrol and start from scratch,” Patty Taylor, 76, a Democrat, said as she protested Immigration and Customs Enforcement on a south Minneapolis street corner this week. A former trauma nurse, Ms. Taylor wore a skeleton costume and held a sign demanding that Congress “grow a spine.”
Karl Olson, 65, a Republican who lives in a west Minneapolis suburb, was just as adamant as he declared himself “appalled” by people in the city who trailed immigration agents in their vehicles and attempted to interfere with arrests.
“The people of Minneapolis cannot nullify federal law,” Mr. Olson said. “I certainly support peaceful protests from a safe distance, but if they don’t like the fact that our federal authorities are enforcing federal law they should make their concerns known to Congress.”
The technicalities of Homeland Security’s funding are complicated. President Trump’s signature domestic spending and tax cut law, which he signed last year, has already funded the most politically charged agencies under the Homeland Security umbrella — ICE and Customs and Border Protection — with billions of dollars. When funding for the department runs out at midnight, it will be the Transportation Security Administration, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the Coast Guard and other smaller programs that will suffer.
But even as the surge of federal immigration agents recedes in Minnesota, after weeks of smashed car windows, angry protests and bloodshed, emotions are raw. Democrats are in no mood to give Kristi Noem, the homeland security secretary, another penny for any of her department.
“I don’t think Democrats should compromise,” said Naomi Richman, an acupuncturist in the Minneapolis area who helped organize resistance to ICE. She had no problem with a government shutdown if that was what it took to rein in agents and prevent another city from experiencing what she said had felt like a war zone.
“There is no compromise,” she continued. “There are lawless, masked, armed men roaming the streets and taking people out of their homes.”
Republicans are just as determined that Mr. Trump’s drive to deport undocumented immigrants continue unabated. Some Minnesota Republicans, who are concentrated outside the urban cores of the Twin Cities, did welcome Thursday’s announcement by Tom Homan, the president’s border czar, that most immigration agents would depart from the state. But many showed little sympathy for the swarms of protesters whom they blamed for the chaos.
“This is enforcement of federal law, and law enforcement is often graphic and unpleasant,” said Shawn Holster, chairman emeritus of the Minneapolis Republican Party. “It’s an ugly business.”
Senate Democrats maneuvered the government into this cul-de-sac by persuading Republicans to break off Homeland Security funding from a broader bill that funded the rest of the government through September. With Homeland Security isolated, expectations from Democratic voters for a clear victory could make the department’s shutdown lengthy.
The 10 guardrails that Senate Democrats are demanding include prohibiting immigration enforcement agents from wearing face coverings; barring enforcement actions at sensitive areas such as schools, medical facilities and churches; and preventing officers from entering people’s homes without judicial warrants. They also have asked that officer training be expanded and that profiling based on race, ethnicity or spoken language stop.
David Wilson, an immigration lawyer in Minneapolis, said those conditions were common sense. During a Wednesday news conference with the American Immigration Council, he described the range of clients he had taken on in recent weeks. They included a Malaysian pastor who is lawfully in the United States who was arrested while driving to church and was then detained for weeks, and his own staff member, a 23-year-old Minnesota-born woman who was swarmed by officers demanding that she prove her citizenship.
“We are asking for legislation that protects American values,” Mr. Wilson said. “We are not asking for a lot.”
Congressional Republicans have so far rejected those proposals, and they say they are reflecting the will of people like Alex Plechash, a city councilman in the upscale Minneapolis suburb of Wayzata and the chairman of the Minnesota Republican Party. Mr. Plechash conceded that the level of fear and tensions around the Twin Cities remained high and that ICE might have gone too far. But he said the way to address that was through a thorough investigation, not by holding back funding.
“I think this thing was probably mishandled and probably there are lessons to be learned,” he said. But trying to “hamstring” federal agents and threaten a government shutdown is not right, he added. “Who wants to see the Coast Guard shut down, for crying out loud?” he asked.
For Minnesota Republicans, the masks are necessary for ICE agents, to prevent their being targeted through the releasing of their personal information or other means. “The unfortunate thing is the protesters and the organized anti-ICE efforts here have put these agents at severe risk,” Mr. Plechash said.
However the impasse ends, Democrats believe they have won the political battle. Partisan Republicans may be as dug in as they are, but polls indicate swing voters, especially independents, have turned against the tactics of Mr. Trump’s deportation force.
Saed Wadi, a Palestinian American, is a case in point. Over lunch at his Minneapolis restaurant, World Street Kitchen, he said he favored immigration enforcement but wanted to see it done “humanely.”
Mr. Wadi historically voted for Democrats but chose a third-party candidate in the 2024 presidential election because he disapproved of both parties. Now, he said agreed with Democrats’ requests to rein in ICE.
“ICE, every day,” he said, “they put guns in people’s faces.”
Pooja Salhotra covers breaking news across the United States.
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