‘Stop the madness’: Obama’s DHS secretary slams Congress for punishing workers

The Senate has once again voted against funding the Department of Homeland Security. Per The Hill, this ongoing stalemate has former DHS Secretary Jeh Johnson urging lawmakers to finally fund the department and pay its employees, who have now been working for over a month without a paycheck.

Johnson, who served under Obama, said that only the U.S. government can tell employees to work. “We’ve got to stop with these funding fights,” Johnson explained. “It used to be annual. Now it’s occurring several times a year, and I’m afraid it’s only going to get worse unless somebody, through strong leadership, intervenes and says, ‘Stop the madness.’ And you can’t punish the workers, it’s not their fault.”

Senate and House Democrats have been holding firm, refusing to approve funding for DHS unless necessary reforms are introduced to its subagencies, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Patrol (CBP). The aggressive tactics used thus far to roll out Trump’s deportation agenda have resulted in countless injuries and the unfortunate deaths of two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis.

Their concerns are valid but the fallout from the delay is growing

Johnson is pushing for lawmakers to separate policy disagreements from funding the government. “Separate the two,” he urged. “Go have the debate about masks, about judicial warrants versus administrative warrants, and a bunch of other things. But decouple that from the funding and paying the workforce.”

This shutdown is having a very real impact on thousands of essential workers. For instance, Johnson specifically advocated for Transportation Security Administration (TSA) officers. These are the folks “there to look for bombs on the airplane you and your family are about to get on,” he reminded everyone. “So, there needs to be an appropriation to fund this.” Even airlines are worried and banded together to lobby for TSA and other airport staff.

With no clear end in sight, some lawmakers are trying to find creative ways to get funds back into the department. Senator John Kennedy (R-LA) thinks Republicans should first pass a bill to fund DHS but exclude ICE, and then tackle ICE funding through a reconciliation bill. Interestingly, the Democrats have already suggested this and have been turned down.

Meanwhile, the White House is hoping to get around Democratic opposition. Border czar Tom Homan met with centrist Democrats to negotiate a deal and has committed to keep working at it until they reach an agreement. Senate Majority Leader John Thune has even warned that the Senate might have to cancel its two-week recess, which was set to start at the end of next week, if it can’t get a DHS deal done.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer is even trying a new tactic, setting up a vote for Saturday that’s tangentially related to reopening TSA. “The chaos at TSA is reaching a boiling point. We need to reopen it as quickly as possible,” Schumer said in a floor speech on Friday, urging senators to “vote yes tomorrow.”