Expressing the Support of the House of Representatives for the Department of Homeland Security

Floor Speech

Mr. Speaker, after 40 days of this Republican shutdown of the Department of Homeland Security, this symbolic resolution is all that my colleagues on the other side of the aisle have.

Let's be clear: We are here today because Republicans who control the White House, the Senate, and this House have failed to govern. Their failure, and their failure alone, has produced this shutdown of the Department of Homeland Security.

Instead of sitting down to negotiate a serious path forward, they have brought us this: a nonbinding resolution that does nothing to reopen the Department of Homeland Security, nothing to pay its workforce, and nothing to make our country safer.

A resolution is not a paycheck. A resolution is not accountability. A resolution is not a substitute for governing. Transportation security officers are working without a paycheck right now. The men and women of FEMA, CISA, and across DHS are showing up every day, not knowing when they will be paid. They do not need our words; they need a check. They need this shutdown to end.

Let me be clear about where Democrats stand. Democrats have been fighting for the TSA workforce and the broader DHS mission long before Republicans discovered this week that DHS is more than ICE and CBP.

I, personally, have worked for more than one decade to give TSA personnel the same employment protection as other Federal workers. When TSA and the American Federation of Government Employees reached a collective bargaining agreement 2 years ago, I was proud to celebrate that milestone with them.

House Republicans voted against those very protections, and now, the Trump administration is moving to strip TSOs of their collective bargaining rights. This is a record.

This is how we got here: Donald Trump, Stephen Miller, Tom Homan, Kristi Noem, and Corey Lewandowski have tried to turn DHS into a national police force, a weapon for their political agenda, while systematically neglecting the critical missions of TSA, FEMA, CISA, and every other component outside of ICE and CBP. House Republicans watched it happen and failed to say a word, and Americans are less safe for it.

We are here because Americans saw their fellow citizens, Renee Good and Alex Pretti, gunned down by masked DHS agents in broad daylight for exercising their First Amendment rights. The American people have rightly demanded change.

We are here because thousands of employees have already left DHS as a result of Republican mismanagement and intimidation, leaving dangerous staffing gaps in some of the most technically demanding positions in the Federal Government.

H. Res. 1128 does not mention any of that. It does not mention that, for over 1 year, the Trump administration has withheld or delayed homeland security grants to State, local, Tribal, and territorial governments. Even before this shutdown, disaster survivors have had to wait for relief, and first responders have lacked the resources they need to protect their communities. Words on paper will not fix that. Only real action will.

The resolution does not mention that DHS and FEMA continue to withhold counterterrorism funding for nonprofits, synagogues, churches, and mosques, the very institutions that have been targeted by terrorist attacks on American soil.

A resolution is not protection. Funding is protection.

The resolution does not mention that the administration has politicized DHS' cybersecurity mission, leaving our critical infrastructure and Federal networks more vulnerable than they should be. This resolution will not secure a single network. Only leadership and funding will do that.

Let us tell the whole story here: The Trump administration caused this shutdown. The Trump administration has disparaged and diminished the DHS workforce since the first day it took office. The Trump administration has made the American people less safe in the process.

House Democrats have been at the negotiating table from the very beginning. We want DHS funded and reopened. We have said so consistently, and if House Republicans were sincere about ending the shutdown their own failures created, then they would work with us, fund the full mission of DHS, and answer the public's legitimate demand for accountability and reform of ICE and CBP.

Some Republicans are beginning to see the light, but who remains standing in the way? Donald Trump.

Don't just take my word for it. Republican Senator John Kennedy of Louisiana told FOX News on Monday night that when Senate Republican Leader Thune informed the President that his Conference was prepared to accept the Democratic compromise position, the President said: No deals with the Democrats.

It gets worse. The President is now attaching new conditions to ending the shutdown, including his so-called SAVE Act. That makes no sense. It has nothing to do with funding the DHS workforce. Yet instead of showing any leadership, House Republicans are backing the President's order to deploy untrained ICE officers into airports-- contrary to their mission and contrary to common sense--apparently, to intimidate travelers.

In fact, we have learned that in airports where ICE has been deployed, waiting times at TSA screening checkpoints have actually gone up. While all of that is happening, we are here debating a nonbinding resolution that will not pay a single TSO, will not reopen a single office, and will not make a single American safer.

The American people deserve better than this Republican failure theater. The DHS workforce deserves better. I urge my colleagues to stop the performance and start governing--not a resolution, but action.

I want to help my colleague out on the other side. Everybody in this country knows that Donald Trump is running everything. Nothing happens in Washington without Donald Trump's approval. Legislation is not passed unless he agrees with it. If they were strong enough, they would admit that.

Republicans run the executive branch. They run both bodies of the legislative branch, but now you blame Democrats on your inability to get things done.

Let me help you out.

This resolution does not pay one TSO, FEMA, or CISA employee. It doesn't pay a mortgage. It doesn't pay a car note. It doesn't buy groceries. Quit pretending like you are doing something to help the people.

Before this debate is over, I am going to give you a chance to put your mouth where it ought to be on this resolution.

But for this point, HSI's mission is not to walk in airports and assist ICE. That is not why they were created. They are an investigatory body. They ought to be out here in communities finding bad people. You have changed their mission. You--your President--has changed their mission, so they are now doing things for which they were not trained to do.

For the record, our loyal and faithful TSOs who you say you love, their training is from 4 to 6 months to make sure that individuals who get on planes don't have anything in their possession that would bring it down. Our ICE agents are trained for 47 days. Now, can you tell me how someone who is trained for 47 days is going to help somebody do a job where the training is almost double what is required?

The technology that they do in the screening, no ICE agent performs that. No TSO walks up and down an airport trying to keep crowds in line. That is not their mission, nor should they be harming people in communities like we have seen with our own eyes.

Let's get back to basics. If you really want to help our loyal TSOs, as you say, then let's pay them. Put a resolution on the floor that says you want to pay them right now, but you are afraid to do it because the White House is calling the shots.

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Mr. THOMPSON of Mississippi. Excuse me. You would yield yourself such time as you choose. The gentleman is recognized.

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Mr. THOMPSON of Mississippi. Mr. Speaker, for the record, the CISA employees, over 1,000, were discharged by the DOGE committee before the shutdown occurred. We want to make sure the Record reflects that, so this shutdown does not comport with what was said by the speaker.

Mr. Speaker, House Republicans actually have the ability to stop this performance art and stop the shutdown of their own making today. We should send the compromised bill to reopen DHS to the Senate right now. Let us pay our TSA, FEMA, and CISA personnel, who will continue to reform ICE and CBP as the American people demand.

7481, the Department of Homeland Security Appropriations Act of 2026, and ask for its immediate consideration in the House.

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Mr. THOMPSON of Mississippi. Mr. Speaker, so what is your--I didn't understand you.

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Mr. THOMPSON of Mississippi. Mr. Speaker, there you have it.

House Republicans have an hour to debate a nonbinding symbolic resolution but not even a few seconds to do the job that would actually pay our DHS workers. This is the Republican DHS shutdown.

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Mr. THOMPSON of Mississippi. Mr. Speaker, may I inquire as to how much time is remaining.

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Mr. THOMPSON of Mississippi. Mr. Speaker, I reserve the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, this shutdown is a result of Republican's failure to govern. Democrats have been at the negotiating table for weeks, and the American people are demanding accountability and reform for ICE and CBP.

We cannot forget that two American citizens got killed by masked Federal agents for merely exercising their First Amendment rights on the streets of a major city, and then their government turned around and called them domestic terrorists without any evidence whatsoever. That cannot happen again. Democrats are here fighting to prevent it from happening ever again.

Where are Republicans? They are here offering symbolic resolutions to score political points for the White House. They are not reforming ICE and CBP. They are not negotiating. If they want Democrats to vote with them, they have to earn our vote.

Mr. Speaker, one of President Trump's top informal advisers, Steve Bannon, recently said that the President's deployment of ICE to the Nation's airports was a ``test run'' before ICE's deployment to election sites during November's midterm elections.

Now, why, Mr. Speaker, would Immigration and Customs Enforcement be needed at State and locally run election sites?

The Trump administration has tried to make DHS and ICE into their private, politically-motivated national police to intimidate travelers at the airport now and voters at the ballot box in November.

That is why the American people are demanding that Congress reform ICE, but Congress could reopen the Department today while those reforms continue to be worked on. House Republicans and Donald Trump, however, are standing in the way.

Mr. Speaker, in closing, Republican failures have shut down the Department of Homeland Security for more than 40 days.

Before this Republican shutdown, the Trump administration did its dead level best to hollow out the Department and make America less safe.

At least 2,000 permanent FEMA staff have left that agency since the day Donald Trump took office.

$275 million in nonprofit security grant program funds remain stuck at DHS and FEMA instead of helping high-risk, nonprofit organizations like churches, mosques, and synagogues.

At the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, the Trump administration terminated, reassigned, or pressured into resigning nearly 1,000 employees.

The former CISA Acting Director said that the vacancy rate at the agency hampered its ability to fully support national security objectives.

The President's fiscal year 2026 budget called for roughly $500 million in cuts to CISA, including cutting programs meant to secure our elections from foreign bad actors.

At TSA, the Trump administration has moved to cut collective bargaining agreements meant to improve working conditions for the personnel keeping our airways safe.

For over a year, Republicans have failed DHS and the American people at every turn, yet Republicans are shameless enough to lecture us about supporting DHS.

Republicans have the power to end this shutdown today. Instead of wasting time on symbolic resolutions, they could pass H.R. 7481, the Democratic compromise proposal that would allow DHS to reopen while we continue to work on reforms to ICE and CBP, but instead, Republicans seem almost addicted to failure.

To my colleagues on the other side of the aisle: Take ``yes'' for an answer. Let's stop the failure theater and reopen DHS today.

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Mr. THOMPSON of Mississippi. Mr. Speaker, on that I demand the yeas and nays.

The yeas and nays were ordered.

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