President Donald Trump blames Democrats for the partial government shutdown as they refuse to approve DHS funding.
The Democrats have issued a list of demands that would basically make it make it all but impossible for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to carry out its mission to find and remove illegal aliens who are present in the U.S.
In addition to immigration enforcement policies, Democrats are also concerned with present border security funding levels.
Ira Mehlman is media director for The Federation for American Immigration Reform.
"The immigration enforcement agencies actually have a reserve because the reconciliation bill put aside a large amount of money for their enforcement efforts, so right now they are not being affected. You know longer term obviously it is going to make a difference,” he said.
Mehlman says the Democrats want to require the issuance of judicial warrants before ICE executes arrests.
"You have tens of millions of people who are here illegally to go before a judge in each case and get a warrant effectively grinds the system to a halt. They're demanding that ICE not operate in certain areas and are also demanding that ICE agents not mask themselves even though there's been a 1,300% increase in assaults against ICE agents."
Mehlman says agreeing to any of the outrageous demands being made by Democrats to fund DHS would constitute a capitulation and a return to the nonenforcement policies of the Biden administration, which voters soundly rejected in 2024.
