Senate Democrat explains why chamber will fail to avert another partial shutdown this week

John Fetterman opposed his party’s efforts to force Republicans to extend Obamacare subsidies over a shutdown vote last year

Sen. John Fetterman warned on Sunday that the two parties in Washington were little closer to averting a partial government shutdown looming at the end of the week as negotiations on funding for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) continue.

The senator spoke on Sunday Morning Futures on Fox News, where host Maria Bartiromo asked him if he would support a funding package for DHS at the end of the week. Fetterman was noncommittal, but pointed to a series of reforms to DHS and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) that Democrats want to see enacted in exchange for their votes.

He added that a partial shutdown was likely, as he didn’t see the chamber making much progress towards reaching an agreement on funding for DHS.

“If I had to say now, they probably expect that there will be a shutdown because things are [...] committed to do that,” Fetterman told Fox News on Sunday.

After Congress passed a two-week continuing resolution at the beginning of last week, the Senate began a countdown clock to address those disagreements in legislation. Republicans have rejected some out of hand, including requiring ICE officers to remove their masks, but have signaled an openness to considering others. Only DHS and its related agencies would be affected if Congress misses the funding deadline on Feb. 13, as the funding bill for DHS was unhitched from a larger long-term spending package.

Sen. John Fetterman said that he expected a partial shutdown to occur at the end of the week due to disagreements over DHS funding in the Senate (Fox News - Sunday Morning Futures)

Democrats in the House and Senate have released a list of 10 demands they want to see codified in legislation in exchange for their votes on DHS funding legislation this week. Reports on Sunday indicated that Senate Democrats had finished writing bill text for their party’s desired reforms.

On the list of proposed ICE reforms: Restrictions on the scope of ICE raids, an end to enforcement near schools and other “sensitive” locations, and official standards against racial profiling. Some Republicans, as Fetterman noted, have called those demands a “wish list” and dismissed them out of hand.

But even the Trump administration and the president himself have admitted that a tactical shift is necessary amid a massive public outcry over the deaths of two Americans shot and killed by ICE and Border Patrol agents in Minneapolis, where a massive immigration enforcement surge has been going on for months. In recent days, the White House has shifted out the top ICE commander in the region, installed a new one, and stated that hundreds of ICE agents will be pulled out of the city.

Democrats are “certainly not going to get all 10” items on their agenda for DHS reform, Fetterman told Bartiromo. But he also added that he personally had no idea what his own party’s “red lines” for DHS funding would be.

The surge of ICE and DHS forces to Minneapolis has led many Democrats to demand reforms to the agencies in exchange for votes on legislation to keep them funded (AFP via Getty Images)

Fetterman, in the past, has been among the least willing in his party to withhold his vote for government funding measures and is also a supporter of tougher immigration enforcement. He supported the Laken Riley Act in early 2025 and on Sunday reiterated that he supports deporting immigrants with criminal backgrounds. He also opposed his party’s efforts to force Republicans to the table last year by withholding their votes for government funding legislation until a deal was struck to extend federal health care subsidies; those efforts failed.

His colleagues in the chamber are much more critical of ICE’s operations and have called for Kristi Noem, the secretary of DHS, to resign.

“The agency is being run by people who have no idea what they're doing and don't seem to give a s**t about the constitutional rights of the American people,” Sen. Mark Kelly, D-Ariz., told The Independent in late January.

To pass a funding package to keep DHS running beyond Feb. 13, Senate Republicans will need votes from at least four Democrats in the chamber to avert a filibuster, with Fetterman’s vote likely to be one. Senate Republican leader John Thune has raised the possibility that DHS will need to be funded via repeat continuing resolutions for the time being as the chamber works out disagreements over ICE reforms.

“A two-week CR probably means there’s going to be another two-week CR and then maybe another two-week CR after that,” Thune told reporters in late January, according to The Hill, adding: “I just think it’s going to be really, really hard to get anything done.”