Democrats reach deal with White House, Senate Republicans to avert government shutdown

Originally Published: 29 JAN 26 12:22 ET

Updated: 29 JAN 26 18:58 ET

By Morgan Rimmer, Ted Barrett, Manu Raju, CNN

(CNN) — A bipartisan funding deal has been reached to avoid a government shutdown, the top Senate Democrat announced, and Senate GOP leaders are taking steps to try to schedule a vote for Thursday night.

The deal, according to Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, includes a two-week stopgap funding extension for the Department of Homeland Security that Democrats had requested. It also separates the DHS bill from a package of bipartisan spending bills to fund critical agencies through September, including the departments of Defense, Health and Human Services, Labor, Education, Transportation and Housing and Urban Development.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune and his leadership team are working to determine whether they can get all of their members to agree to swiftly move the package, three sources familiar with the matter told CNN.

The deal signals that GOP leaders ultimately moved toward Democrats’ demands, stripping the DHS bill from the larger funding package and instead temporarily funding the department while the two parties debate broader reforms to US Immigration and Customs Enforcement, two of the sources said.

The two-week extension to DHS funding is the time frame that Senate Democrats had been pushing for and shorter than what the White House had initially offered.

The pace at which the talks have progressed underscores the White House’s desire to avoid another shutdown, as well as a tacit acknowledgement from Republicans of the political risks of inaction amid heightened public outcry over ICE’s harsh tactics.

President Donald Trump urged lawmakers to back the deal.

“I am working hard with Congress to ensure that we are able to fully fund the Government, without delay. Republicans and Democrats in Congress have come together to get the vast majority of the Government funded until September, while at the same time providing an extension to the Department of Homeland Security,” he wrote on Truth Social.

He added that he hoped “both Republicans and Democrats will give a very much needed Bipartisan ‘YES’ Vote.”

If an updated package is passed by the Senate, however, it would have to be approved by both chambers, meaning the narrowly divided House would have to return to Washington and final approval could be delayed until Monday. Speaker Mike Johnson, however, has not committed to exactly when the House might return.

“We’ll get everybody back as soon as we can,” the speaker said earlier Thursday. “The weather may be an issue. There are some members on codels across the world, literally, so we’ll do the best we can.”

Eleventh-hour talks

Capitol Hill leaders and the White House were in negotiations throughout the day on how to move forward, seeking to avoid a costly partial federal funding lapse at the week’s end.

While an initial vote to advance a six-bill funding package failed earlier in the day, hours later negotiations were down to a final sticking point on how long to temporarily extend funding for DHS after stripping it from the broader package.

Democrats, keen to seize on widespread discontent after the deadly shootings of two US citizens in Minneapolis this month, said they would not support a short-term funding extension for DHS that lasts more than two weeks. The Trump administration, meanwhile, pushed for six.

“More people can get killed in two weeks,” Connecticut Sen. Chris Murphy told CNN.

Sen. Markwayne Mullin, however, argued Congress would need at least two weeks procedurally to renegotiate, consider and pass a new DHS funding bill.

“It’s too short. We can’t do it in two weeks,” the Oklahoma Republican told reporters.

“By the time you go through the amendments, you go through cloture, you go through all that, it’s probably not enough. We asked for six – I mean, we may settle at three, we may settle at five, we may settle at six, I don’t know. But two, if that’s what they’re insisting — OK, maybe. But they got to be realistic on the time frame,” Mullin said.

Seven conservatives had joined all Democrats to block the broader funding package from moving forward. But Republican Majority Leader John Thune expressed confidence that lawmakers would back a final deal with “a good, strong vote on both sides.”

The push in the Senate Thursday came after Schumer had laid out his caucus’ demands the day before. The changes to ICE tactics and protocols that the party wants to see included in any funding bill for DHS are: tightening the use of warrants and end roving patrols, enforcing a code of conduct comparable to force policies for state and local law enforcement, and for ICE agents to remove their masks and wear body cameras.

However, even if DHS were to go unfunded, ICE will remain operational through funding that stems from Trump’s domestic policy package that was passed last summer.

This headline and story have been updated with additional developments.

The-CNN-Wire
™ & © 2026 Cable News Network, Inc., a Warner Bros. Discovery Company. All rights reserved.