Trump Threatens to Deploy Federal Immigration Agents to Airports Amid DHS Shutdown

Amid an ongoing standoff between Senate Republicans and Democrats over funding for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), President Donald Trump on Saturday threatened to send Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents to airports across the U.S.

“If the Radical Left Democrats don’t immediately sign an agreement to let our Country, in particular, our Airports, be FREE and SAFE again, I will move our brilliant and patriotic ICE Agents to the Airports where they will do Security like no one has ever seen before,” the president wrote in a post on Truth Social.

Trump said ICE agents' duties at airports would include “the immediate arrest of all Illegal Immigrants who have come into our Country.”

His comments come one day after Senate Democrats voted down Republicans' efforts to pass a bill funding DHS, which has been partially shut down since mid-February.

The shutdown has caused Transportation Security Administration (TSA) officers, who conduct security checks at U.S. airports, to go unpaid, resulting in mass callouts and lengthy security lines nationwide.

ICE, another DHS agency, is not affected by the shutdown as it received $75 billion in additional funds from the One Big Beautiful Bill, the president’s major legislative package passed and signed into law last year.

In February, Democrats vowed to keep DHS shut down until Republicans agreed to new requirements for ICE agents, including mandatory identification badges and a ban on face coverings.

This move followed the deaths of two Americans—Renee Good and Alex Pretti—who were killed by federal agents in Minnesota during a prolonged ICE deployment in January.

This week, bipartisan negotiators on Capitol Hill renewed efforts to end the shutdown. Trump’s border czar, Tom Homan, met with Senate lawmakers earlier in the week.

Senator John Hoeven (R-N.D.) told reporters Friday that Republicans offered Democrats a new proposal, including body cameras, enhanced training, and limits on arrests in sensitive locations such as churches, hospitals, and schools.

“We’ve offered body cams, more training, limiting arrests for sensitive areas like churches and hospitals and so forth, schools, it’s a long list,” Hoeven said. “I think the Democrats need to come back to us now and talk to us about what they’re willing to do.”

The renewed negotiations coincide with a key Senate committee’s evaluation of President Trump’s nomination of Senator Markwayne Mullin (R-Okla.) to lead DHS. Earlier this month, Trump announced that Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem would step down at the end of March and that Mullin would be nominated as her replacement.