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Republicans pan Democrats’ demands for ICE reform in DHS funding, with little time to reach deal
Washington — Senate Republicans criticized Democrats’ list of demands to rein in Immigration and Customs Enforcement on Thursday, further reducing the odds of reaching a deal to keep the Department of Homeland Security funded beyond next week’s deadline.
“As of right now, we aren’t anywhere close to having any sort of an agreement that would enable us to fund the Department of Homeland Security,” Senate Majority Leader John Thune said on the Senate floor Thursday.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries released a list of policies to impose “guardrails” on DHS on Wednesday night, including by restricting immigration agents from wearing masks and requiring them to display an ID and use body cameras. The Democrats also demanded agents be banned from entering private property without judicial warrants, along with requiring agents to verify that someone is not a U.S. citizen before holding them in immigration detention, among other things.
“The American people rightfully expect their elected representatives to take action to rein in ICE and ensure no more lives are lost. It is critical that we come together to impose common sense reforms and accountability measures that the American people are demanding,” Schumer and Jeffries wrote.
The Democrats also said there are steps the administration can take immediately to “show good faith,” including removing DHS Secretary Kristi Noem from her position and fully ramping down the immigration operation in Minneapolis.
Thune, a South Dakota Republican, called Democrats’ demands “unrealistic and unserious,” while saying they aren’t “even willing to engage in a negotiation and discussion to try and reach a result.”
“This is not a blank-check situation where Republicans just agree to a list of Democrat demands,” Thune said.
Off the Senate floor, Thune told reporters that there are a number of things on Democrats’ list of demands that appear to be designed as “messaging” priorities, but he acknowledged that “there’s some room there.”
“There’s some things that could get done,” Thune said. “But, you know, you have to have people at the table to do that.”
Sen. Katie Britt of Alabama, who’s leading the negotiations for Senate Republicans, quickly responded to Democrats’ demands on X Wednesday night. She called the proposal a “ridiculous Christmas list of demands for the press.”
“This is NOT negotiating in good faith, and it’s NOT what the American people want,” Britt said. “They continue to play politics to their radical base at the expense of the safety of Americans. DHS, FEMA, Secret Service, and the Coast Guard run out of money in 9 days. Democrats don’t seem to care one bit.”
Earlier in the day Wednesday, Schumer and Jeffries held a news conference where they outlined some of the demands. They encouraged Republicans to “get serious” about negotiations on reforming the nation’s immigration enforcement operation.
“This is turning America inside out in a way we haven’t seen in a very long time,” Schumer said.
The back and forth comes after the House voted to fund the bulk of the government earlier this week, following a four-day partial shutdown. The package extended funding for the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees ICE and Customs and Border Protection, through Feb. 13. The move was meant to give lawmakers time to negotiate long-term funding and reforms to ICE and CBP.
Thune pointed to the tight timeline Thursday. He noted that Democrats insisted that DHS only be funded for two weeks.
“We have one week and one day left to pass the Department of Homeland Security appropriations bill,” Thune said. “The onus is on Democrats to negotiate in good faith and reach an agreement quickly.”
Thune argued that Democrats have “reopened” negotiations, which means “taking up ideas and priorities from both sides.” He pointed to the need for a “serious discussion” about the “climate of harassment — and worse — that law enforcement has been facing, simply trying to do their jobs.”
He said the issue of cooperation between federal and local law enforcement must also be discussed, saying “too many jurisdictions prohibit local law enforcement from cooperating with Immigration and Customs Enforcement,” in an apparent nod to so-called sanctuary city policies that Republicans have widely opposed.
“I hope my Democrat colleagues are ready to have some conversations with the White House about these and other issues,” Thune said.
The majority leader argued that “the White House has demonstrated that it’s taking things seriously,” pointing to a recent move to require all agents in Minneapolis to wear body cameras and the administration’s move to withdraw some personnel from the city.
“I want to see my Democrat colleagues take things seriously as well,” he added.
The National Quarantine Center is located at the University of Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha.
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Sixteen of the 18 passengers transferred to the U.S. from a cruise ship where there was an outbreak of hantavirus arrived in Omaha, Neb., on Monday for evaluation after disembarking the vessel in Spain’s Canary Islands over the weekend.
Of the 15 U.S. citizens and one dual U.S.-British citizen who arrived in Nebraska, all but one are currently being housed in the National Quarantine Unit. That patient tested positive for the virus and was being housed in the Nebraska Biocontainment Unit, officials said at a Monday news conference. The 15 people in the quarantine unit will continue to be monitored for signs of the illness.
Passengers carry their belongings in plastic bags after being evacuated from the MV Hondius after docking in the Granadilla Port on Sunday in Tenerife, part of the Canary Islands, Spain.
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Nebraska may seem an unlikely location to process these individuals, but it is home to the National Quarantine Unit — the only federally funded quarantine unit in the U.S. — and the separate Nebraska Biocontainment Unit. They are highly specialized facilities located at the University of Nebraska Medical Center (UNMC) and widely considered among the best in the world.
The $1 million, five-room biocontainment unit was dedicated in 2005. It was a joint project with Nebraska Health and Human Services and the UNMC. It is set up to safely provide medical care for patients with highly hazardous and infectious diseases and was used in 2014 to treat two doctors infected with Ebola. The National Quarantine Unit was completed in late 2019. It cost nearly $20 million, according to the Associated Press. Both facilities were used during the COVID-19 epidemic.
“We are prepared for situations exactly like this,” Dr. Michael Ash, CEO of Nebraska Medicine, said in a statement. “Our teams have trained for decades alongside federal and state partners to make sure we can safely provide care while protecting our staff and the broader community. We are proud to support this national effort.”
Two additional U.S. passengers on the cruise ship — a couple, with one showing symptoms of hantavirus — were transferred for monitoring to Emory University Hospital, where another advanced biocontainment facility is located.
When the biocontainment unit was first dedicated more than 20 years ago, the biggest concerns were anthrax attacks and severe acute respiratory syndrome, more commonly known as SARS, Dr. Phil Smith, who spearheaded the efforts at Nebraska Medical Center to create the biocontainment unit, told the AP in 2020. Smith died last year.
A hallway leading to rooms at the Nebraska Biocontainment Unit at the University of Nebraska Medical Center.
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The quarantine unit features 20 negative-pressure rooms designed to keep potentially harmful particles from escaping by maintaining lower air pressure inside than outside the rooms. The single-occupancy rooms provide patients with attached bathrooms, exercise equipment and Wi-Fi, according to the medical center.
“We have protocols in the quarantine unit that provide for safe care of these of these persons, including just all the activities of daily living so that they can … have a comfortable stay but also have it in an area that’s protected and limits spread of the pathogen,” Dr. Michael Wadman, the medical director of the National Quarantine Unit, said at a Friday news conference.
The biocontainment unit, by contrast, is a patient-care space where people are able to receive medical treatment, Dr. Angela Hewlett, medical director of the biocontainment unit, told reporters Monday.
She emphasized that the facility — which has a 10-bed capacity — operates independently from the quarantine unit and has its own dedicated air-handling system. “We don’t share [it] with any of the rest of the facility,” she said, noting that the unit uses rooftop HEPA filtration and is designed “very differently” from what most people typically imagine in a hospital setting.
One of the rooms in the Nebraska Biocontainment Unit.
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Nebraska Gov. Jim Pillen, speaking at Monday’s news conference, welcomed the recently arrived patients, who are among nearly 150 people from 23 different countries who were aboard the MV Hondius when the illness most commonly transmitted to humans through contact with infected rodents broke out. As of Monday, the World Health Organization has reported at least nine cases of hantavirus, including three deaths.
“We’re glad that you’re here,” Pillen said. “We’re going to ensure that you have the best world-class care possible.”
Pillen also sought to reassure Nebraskans that the facilities are safe and secure: “We’re working diligently to ensure no one leaves the security in an unsecured way at an inappropriate time,” he said. “No one poses a risk to public health, just walking out the front door of the streets of Omaha.”
The hantavirus outbreak on the cruise ship has been identified as the Andes strain of the illness, one that can be spread, though rarely, from person-to-person, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It can cause severe respiratory disease, with early flu-like symptoms.
“The Andes variant of this virus does not spread easily, and it requires prolonged, close contact with someone who is already symptomatic,” according to Adm. Brian Christine, the assistant secretary for health at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, who spoke at Monday’s news conference. “Even so, we have taken this situation very seriously from the very start.”
“The risk of hantavirus to the general public remains very, very low,” he said.
The full quarantine period for hantavirus is 42 days, Christine said, but he added that the patients would be allowed to go home if they remained asymptomatic.
“Right now, the passengers that are all in the assessment phase — they’re going to be here for at least a few days while we do assessments and the coordination on what happens next,” he said, adding that they had the option to remain in the quarantine facility for the full period, for “the safest and most effective option for them.”
new video loaded: Americans Exposed to Hantavirus on Cruise Ship Arrive in United States
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transcript
Americans Exposed to Hantavirus on Cruise Ship Arrive in United States
Eighteen passengers who were aboard the MV Hondius, a cruise ship with a deadly hantavirus outbreak, landed in Omaha on a U.S. government medical flight. The passengers were being monitored at medical facilities in Nebraska and Georgia.
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We’re working diligently to ensure no one leaves the security in an unsecured way at an inappropriate time. No one who poses a risk to public health is walking out the front door of the streets of Omaha or beyond.
By Axel Boada
May 11, 2026
The man charged with attempting to assassinate President Donald Trump at the White House Correspondents’ Association dinner last month pleaded not guilty at a Monday arraignment in federal court.
Cole Tomas Allen, 31, wearing an orange shirt and trousers, was handcuffed and shackled as he was brought into the courtroom in Washington, D.C., federal court. His handcuffs were attached to a chain around his waist, which clanked as he was led to the defense table.
Speaking on behalf of Allen, federal public defender Tezira Abe said her client “pleads not guilty to all four counts as charged,” including attempting to assassinate the president of the United States, in connection with the April 25 incident at the Washington Hilton hotel.
Assistant U.S. Attorney Charles Jones advised the court that they plan to start producing their first tranche of discovery to the defense by the end of the week.
Officials said Allen, a California teacher and engineer, was armed with multiple guns, as well as knives, when he sprinted through a security checkpoint near the event where Trump and other White House officials had gathered with journalists.
He was arrested after an exchange of gunfire with a U.S. Secret Service officer who fired at him multiple times, a criminal complaint said. Allen was not shot during the exchange. The officer, who was wearing a ballistic vest, was shot once in the chest, treated at a hospital and released.
Trump and top members of his Cabinet and Congress were quickly evacuated from the room as others ducked under tables.
Allen was initially charged with attempting to assassinate the president, transportation of a firearm and ammunition through interstate commerce with intent to commit a felony, and discharge of a firearm during a crime of violence. On Tuesday, a federal grand jury indicted him on a new charge in the shooting of a Secret Service agent.
Moments before the attack, Allen had sent his family members a note apologizing and criticizing Trump without mentioning the president by name, according to a transcript of some of his writings provided to NBC News by a senior administration official. Allen also wrote that “administration officials (not including Mr. Patel)” were “targets.”
He also appeared to have taken a selfie in his hotel room. Prosecutors said Allen, who was dressed in a black button-down shirt and black pants, was “wearing a small leather bag consistent in appearance with the ammunition-filled bag later recovered from his person,” as well as a shoulder holster, a sheathed knife, pliers and wire cutters.
Officials have said they believe Allen had traveled by train from California to Washington, D.C., before checking into the hotel.
Allen’s sister, Avriana Allen, told law enforcement that her brother would make radical comments and constantly referenced a plan to fix the world, but said their parents were unaware that he had firearms in the home and that he would regularly train at shooting ranges.
Records show that he had purchased a Maverick 12-gauge shotgun in August 2025 and an Armscor Precision .38 semiautomatic pistol in October 2023.
After his arrest, Allen told the FBI that he did not expect to survive the incident, according to Assistant U.S. Attorney Jocelyn Ballantine. He was briefly placed on suicide watch at the Washington, D.C., jail, where he’s being held.
Allen is expected to appear in court for a June 29 hearing.
At Monday’s arraignment, his legal team said they plan on asking for the “entire office” of the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia to be recused because of U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro’s apparent involvement in the case in a “supervisory role.” Federal public defender Eugene Ohm said some of the evidence they receive from the government will further inform that decision.
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