Chuck Schumer just celebrated one of the biggest wins of his Senate career.
He didn't win a floor vote – he won because Republicans handed it to him.
The man responsible for stopping Schumer is about to become the man who made it possible.
Thune Spent Six Weeks Negotiating the DHS Shutdown and Handed Schumer ICE Funding Cuts
At 2 a.m. Friday morning, the Republican-controlled Senate passed – by unanimous consent – a DHS funding bill that stripped out all funding for Immigration and Customs Enforcement and parts of Customs and Border Protection.
The department has been shut down since mid-February, when Democrats blocked funding to protest Trump's immigration enforcement operations in Minnesota.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune negotiated with Democrats for six weeks, then passed their bill in the middle of the night while most of the country was asleep.
Schumer didn't hide his reaction.
"This is exactly what we wanted," he told reporters. "This is what we asked for, and I'm very proud of my caucus."
He was right.
Senate Majority Leader John Thune – the man whose job it is to advance Trump's agenda – stood on the Senate floor at 2 a.m. and passed a bill the president's own enemies were celebrating as a victory.
Trump found out about it through Fox News.
His reaction was immediate: "It wasn't good. It wasn't appropriate."
He added: "In my opinion, you can't have a bill that's not going to fund ICE. You can't have a bill that's not going to fund any form of law enforcement."
That's the president explaining basic logic to his own Senate majority leader.
Fox News reporter Bill Melugin flagged something the celebration obscured – ICE's civilian support staff, the non-law enforcement workers who keep the agency running day to day, were still cut off from pay under the Senate deal. Those workers hadn't seen a paycheck since the shutdown began in mid-February.
Senate Republicans handed Democrats a concession, shafted the people doing Trump's deportation work, and called it a win.
Then they left town for a two-week Easter recess.
This Is How Democrats Defund ICE During a Government Shutdown Without Winning a Single Vote
Here's what Senate Republicans just established as precedent: ICE funding is negotiable.
That's the only conclusion Democrats can draw from Friday morning.
They didn't need a bill. They didn't need to win a floor vote. All they needed was to hold out long enough for Senate Republicans to blink – and six weeks later, Thune handed them proof the strategy works.
Democrats didn't get the formal ICE "reforms" they demanded – no judicial warrant requirements, no mandatory unmasking of agents. Senate Republicans are taking a victory lap over that.
But those were always the maximalist demands, the things Democrats asked for knowing they'd never get them.
What Democrats wanted most was to establish that ICE funding is a bargaining chip. That ICE can be defunded by shutting down the government and waiting. On Friday morning, they got it.
Senate Republicans just handed Democrats a blueprint for the next time they want to squeeze Trump's immigration enforcement.
Chris Murphy told MSNBC in 2024 that Democrats had "failed to deliver for the people we care about most" – and by people, he meant illegal aliens. Friday's deal is Murphy's answer to that failure.
A Democratic minority used a Senate shutdown to strip funding from the agency conducting mass deportations, and a Republican majority helped them do it.
Trump Won on Mass Deportations and Senate Republicans Just Undermined Them
A Pew Research poll from September 2024 found that 88 percent of Trump supporters backed mass deportations. Immigration ranked as a leading issue for 82 percent of his voters.
Trump didn't win on tariffs. He didn't win on deficit reduction. He won because tens of millions of Americans watched Biden flood the country with millions of illegal aliens in four years – inundating schools, hospitals, and communities – and they said enough.
Every single person in that 88 percent knew exactly what they were voting for.
Mass deportations require ICE. ICE requires funding. Senate Republicans just let Democrats treat that funding as a chip on the table.
House Republicans – specifically Speaker Mike Johnson, who called the Senate bill "a joke" – blocked the deal and passed their own clean two-month extension of full DHS funding. Trump backed Johnson's move explicitly.
Senate Republicans went on Easter recess. They're not scheduled back until April 13. Thune controls 53 seats. Democrats need 60 votes to pass anything – which means Republicans had all the leverage in this fight and gave it away at 2 a.m. while nobody was watching.
Schumer got what he wanted. The voters who elected Trump to end the invasion at the border deserve Senate Republicans who act like it.
Sources:
- "Trump Rages at GOP's Senate Bill To Fund TSA in Call With Fox: 'Not Appropriate' Without ICE Funding," Mediaite, March 27, 2026.
- "Senate unanimously advances DHS funding deal without ICE and CBP amid shutdown," Fox News, March 27, 2026.
- "House Republicans pass short-term DHS funding bill after rejecting Senate deal," The Hill, March 27, 2026.
- Brianna Lyman, "Americans Shouldn't Need The House To Save Mass Deportations From Weak Senate Republicans," The Federalist, March 27, 2026.
- "Trump Kills Senate Bill To Re-Open DHS Without ICE Funding," Daily Wire, March 27, 2026.