The Senate has a deal to keep the government funded, but GOP fury over earmarks, border policy, and changes to the Department of Homeland Security blew it up late Thursday, all but guaranteeing a partial shutdown this weekend.
Under the agreement, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and President Donald Trump agreed to yank the DHS funding bill from a larger six-bill package and instead keep the agency running on a two-week continuing resolution while lawmakers haggle over changes.
The White House backs the plan, and Democrats are on board. It still is not enough to stop a shutdown, since the House must also approve the package, and time has run out.
Republicans spent hours Thursday night knocking down hold after hold and amendment after amendment. By the end, only one senator was standing in the way.
That was Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina.
Without his consent, the package could not move. Graham made clear he was not budging.
Walking into Majority Leader John Thune’s office late Thursday, Graham called the deal a “bad deal.”
His biggest complaint centered on how Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents were treated in the negotiations and underlying bill.
ICE agents “are not infallible, but I appreciate what they’re doing. I’ve never been more offended than I am right now by what’s being said about these folks,” Graham said.
Graham was far from alone in his frustration. Republicans were deeply split over both the compromise and the original funding package, which failed a key procedural vote earlier Thursday afternoon. Seven Republicans joined Democrats to block it.
Once Trump publicly endorsed the revised deal, Thune and his leadership team scrambled to bring skeptics back into line. The effort fell short.
“Tomorrow’s another day, and hopefully people will be in a spirit to try and get this done tomorrow,” Thune told reporters as he left the Capitol late Thursday.
Normally, a fast-moving, leadership-backed funding package is cleared through the Senate using the hotline process. That allows senators to quickly signal approval, raise concerns, seek changes, or place a hold that stops the bill cold.
According to sources familiar with the discussions, Senate Democrats had not even started the hotline process as of Thursday night. They were waiting for Republicans to sort out their internal fight.
Fueling GOP anger was a provision in the DHS bill that repeals a controversial measure tied to former Special Counsel Jack Smith’s Arctic Frost investigation. The provision allowed senators whose phone records were subpoenaed to sue for up to $500,000 per violation.
Graham has been one of the strongest defenders of that provision and has blocked previous Democratic efforts to repeal it.
Asked whether his hold was tied to the repeal, Graham said it was not. He pointed to an agreement with the Senate Ethics Committee that would prevent him from personally profiting from any lawsuit.
“We can find out a way forward, but not this way,” Graham said.
With the clock ticking and tempers flaring, lawmakers left the Capitol knowing the shutdown they had hoped to avoid was now all but inevitable.
