President Donald Trump held a roundtable discussion Friday at Custer Farms in Chippewa Falls to tout his administration’s efforts to help farmers. 

Trump’s visit is his first to Wisconsin during this year’s election season. First to take the stage on Friday were U.S. Reps. Derrick Van Orden and Tom Tiffany, signaling the importance of the 3rd Congressional District and the Wisconsin gubernatorial contest  for Republicans this year. 

Despite Trump’s waning approval ratings, Van Orden and Tiffany tied themselves to the president, effusively praising him.

Trump appeared on stage for the roundtable with both congressmen as well as U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson, Secretary of Agriculture Brooke Rollins, farm owner Ken Custer, Jake Leinenkugel, Olympic speed skater Jordan Stolz and Joe Thomas, a Hall of Fame former NFL player who played for UW-Madison and now owns a western Wisconsin beef farm. 

Despite its billing as a roundtable discussion of agriculture policy, Trump spoke for more than 40 minutes straight, at times appearing to read from a script and at others riffing on a number of favorite topics including former Presidents Joe Biden and Barack Obama, “Dumbocrats in Congress,” the allegedly “rigged” 2020 presidential election, transgender people, his multi-million dollar D.C. renovation projects and the southern border. 

“These are some very sick puppies that I’m looking at that are running for office and on the other side,” Trump said. “I call them the Dumocrats, D-U-M, you take out the B, a lot of people don’t know, dumb has a b, a lot of people don’t know. You take out the b and change the E, you put the you and you have a Dumocrat, but they are, their policy is just outstandingly bad, and it’s really bad for the farmer, because we were having record stuff, and then we had to put out a fire, we had to extinguish a nuclear weapon.” 

With six months until November’s midterm elections, many of Trump’s signature policies have directly affected the bottom line of Wisconsin farmers. Trump’s tariffs and war in Iran have greatly increased the cost of essentials such as fertilizer and gas while limiting access to foreign markets for corn and soybeans. In western Wisconsin communities close to where he appeared on Friday, Trump’s immigration crackdown in Minnesota’s Twin Cities extended into the Dairy State, directly striking the undocumented migrant labor the region’s farmers rely on. 

“If anybody you hear says that Donald Trump doesn’t care about the farmers, you can look him straight in the eye and tell him that’s a pile of manure, because the man is right back there,” Van Orden said. “We’re going to make sure our farmers don’t have to wring their hands at night because they’re worried about paying bills.” 

Trump and other speakers promised that the administration and congressional Republicans are working to ease the burden on American farmers, but offered little in the way of concrete proposals for how fertilizer, seed, gas and equipment will get cheaper or how milk, corn and soybeans will get easier to sell. 

“Your fertilizer prices are going to go way down, just like they were four months ago,” Trump said. “Your fertilizer is down, your energy’s down, your oil, your gas is all coming way down. And frankly, I thought it would go much higher than it did.” 

In the days leading up to Friday’s event Democratic politicians and Democratic-aligned groups rolled out a series of tours, roundtables and online events to highlight complaints about administration policies on all manner of things. 

“Wisconsin farmers do backbreaking work to produce world-class products that feed the world and drive our rural economies. President Trump came into office promising to support our farmers, but instead has taken every opportunity to jack up their costs, limit their customers, and cut into their margins,” U.S. Senator Tammy Baldwin (D-Wisconsin) said in a statement. “Between Donald Trump’s trade war, unnecessary war in Iran, and attacks on our health care system, Wisconsin farmers are paying more for everything, and Donald Trump has no solutions to the problems he’s caused. As President Trump visits Wisconsin, he owes our farmers more than lip service – they need real relief from the high costs they are paying.”

WASHINGTON — U.S. Senate Republicans released a roughly $70 billion spending package Monday night that will keep Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Border Patrol operating for the rest of President Donald Trump’s term without any of the new constraints Democrats have demanded.

The legislation also includes $1 billion “to support enhancements by the United States Secret Service relating to the East Wing Modernization Project, including above-ground and below-ground security features.”

Trump, who had the East Wing of the White House bulldozed to make way for his $300 or $400 million ballroom project, had said it would be funded by private donors and not taxpayers. White House officials have said the ballroom is critical for national security when top officials are gathered, following an April 25 incident in which a gunman opened fire at a dinner at the Washington Hilton attended by Trump.

Iowa Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley, chairman of the Judiciary Committee, said in a statement the panel “is taking action to help provide certainty for federal law enforcement and safer streets for American families.” 

“We will work to ensure this critical funding gets signed into law without unnecessary delay,” he added. 

Senate Budget Committee ranking member Jeff Merkley, D-Ore., said in a statement the package shows “Republicans are ignoring the needs of middle-class America and instead funneling money into Trump’s ballroom and throwing billions at two lawless agencies.”

He noted the Department of Homeland Security has more than $100 billion from Republicans’ signature tax and spending cuts package it hasn’t spent. 

“Throughout this process, Democrats will continue to show the American people that we are for bringing down costs, making it easier to get ahead, and building an economy where families thrive and billionaires pay their fair share,” Merkley said. “It is clear that the country has had enough of the Republican ‘families lose, billionaires win’ agenda.”

Billions for immigration enforcement

The package’s release follows a record-setting shutdown at the Department of Homeland Security that began after the two parties were unable to reach a compromise on new guardrails for immigration operations after federal agents shot and killed two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis in January.  

The Judiciary Committee’s bill includes $30.725 billion for ICE, $3.47 billion for Customs and Border Protection and $1.457 billion for the Department of Justice.

The bill from the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs allocates $19.1 billion for CBP to hire Border Patrol staff and $7.45 billion for ICE to hire Homeland Security Investigations agents.

CPB will receive an additional $3.45 billion to purchase new technology “to combat the entry or exit of illicit narcotics at ports of entry,” to upgrade border surveillance technology and to conduct initial screenings of unaccompanied children. 

Another $2.5 billion would go to the Homeland Security secretary for any additional border security needs. 

All of the funding would last through Sept. 30, 2029.

Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee Chairman Rand Paul, R-Ky., said in a statement the panel plans to vote later this month to advance the bill. 

“Senate Democrats refuse to vote for a single dollar to secure our borders or enforce our immigration laws, even against the most violent illegal aliens,” Paul said. 

60 votes not needed in Senate

Republicans plan to pass the bill using the same complex budget reconciliation process they used last year to enact their “big, beautiful” law that provided DHS with $170 billion. 

GOP lawmakers voted last month to approve the budget resolution that unlocks the process that comes with many rules and restrictions but avoids the need to get 60 votes in the Senate to end debate. 

Senate Republican leaders chose to separate funding for ICE and Border Patrol from the annual Homeland Security appropriations bill after the two political parties made little progress toward restrictions on immigration agents. 

The stalemate led to a 76-day shutdown for the Department of Homeland Security, which ended in late April after the House sent Trump the annual funding bill the Senate had approved a month earlier.

WASHINGTON — Republicans in Congress are once again looking toward the complex budget reconciliation process as a way to achieve some of their policy goals without Democratic votes. 

GOP leaders were able to use the special pathway last year to approve the “big, beautiful” law that extended tax cuts, overhauled and cut Medicaid, provided hundreds of billions in extra funding for the departments of Defense and Homeland Security, and raised the country’s debt limit by $5 trillion, among other provisions. 

Now, Republicans will try to use the process at least one more time to provide years of funding to the Department of Homeland Security amid a two-month shutdown, with none of the constraints on immigration enforcement that Democrats have sought. 

Democrats’ push to rein in enforcement after federal immigration officers shot and killed two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis led to a record-breaking stalemate over the annual DHS appropriations bill. 

The funding lapse hasn’t yet affected Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection, DHS agencies which Republicans bolstered in the last reconciliation bill. But it has had an impact on the Federal Emergency Management Agency, Secret Service and Transportation Security Administration.

Reconciliation will require Republicans in the House and Senate to be almost completely unified on their goals, especially if the party tries to include elements of a hot-button voter identification bill called the SAVE America Act or other policies that don’t have a significant impact on federal revenue, spending, or the debt limit. 

What goes in and what is kept out of another reconciliation package will become increasingly important to GOP leaders’ reelection message as the country moves closer to November’s midterm elections. 

Why use budget reconciliation? 

Regular bills need a simple majority vote to pass the House, but at least 60 senators need to vote to end debate in that chamber. This step, sometimes called the legislative filibuster, or cloture, forces bipartisanship on most legislation, unless it moves through the reconciliation process. 

Budget reconciliation bills are exempt from that Senate rule. 

So why haven’t Republicans used reconciliation to enact all of their policy goals and campaign promises since taking over unified control last year? 

Budget reconciliation bills must follow a specific process and meet strict requirements in the Senate, known as the Byrd rule, named for former West Virginia Democratic Sen. Robert Byrd.

Very simply, this requires reconciliation bills to address federal spending, revenue, or debt in a way that is not deemed “merely incidental” by the Senate parliamentarian. 

How complicated could reconciliation really be?

Very.

First, the House and Senate must adopt a budget resolution with identical sets of reconciliation instructions for committees. Those guidelines will give committee leaders either a minimum amount to spend during the next decade or a maximum amount they can add to the deficit during that window. 

The Senate cannot approve the budget resolution without going through a marathon amendment voting session referred to as a vote-a-rama, which typically lasts well into the night. 

A budget resolution is a tax and spending blueprint, sort of like a blueprint for building a house before you’ve actually gotten a mortgage or purchased any land. It’s a proposal, but it doesn’t actually change tax law or spend any money. 

Once the budget is adopted, the House committees that receive reconciliation instructions must draft, debate and vote to send their bill to the Budget Committee. 

Then, the Budget Committee bundles all of the reconciliation bills together in one package and sends it to the House floor, where lawmakers must vote to send it to the Senate, where things get even more complex. 

What happens next?

Before a reconciliation bill goes to the Senate floor, it moves through something referred to as the “Byrd bath,” where the Senate parliamentarian determines if each provision fits the strict rules. 

Senate leaders can take up the House-passed version of the bill or work through the committee process on their side of the Capitol. Typically, the upper chamber goes directly to the floor and amends the House-passed bill. 

The Senate then goes through another vote-a-rama session, giving the minority party, currently Democrats, the chance to put all 100 lawmakers in that chamber on the record about various proposals in the bill. 

That process will be especially challenging this year, with Democrats looking to institute guardrails on immigration enforcement activities and get Republicans up for reelection on the record over some of the most pressing issues facing the country. 

If the Senate makes any changes to the House-passed bill, it must go back to that chamber for final approval before it can go to President Donald Trump for his signature. 

If the Senate approves a bill identical to the one passed by the House, it would go to Trump without needing another House vote. 

What exactly is the Byrd rule?

Elements in the bill would violate that rule if they:

• Didn’t change revenue, spending, or the debt limit. 
• Change revenue or spending in a way deemed “merely incidental.”
• Change policy outside the jurisdiction of the authorizing committee.
• Didn’t comply with the committee’s reconciliation instructions in the budget resolution.
• Increases the deficit past the budget window (usually 10 years).
• Change Social Security in any way, shape, or form.

How many times can Republicans use reconciliation? Is it unlimited? 

They have two more chances during this Congress but are limited by how many budget resolutions they can adopt. 

GOP leaders used the fiscal 2025 budget resolution to set up passage of the “big, beautiful” law. They can write a fiscal 2026 budget resolution for one more round and then use the fiscal 2027 budget resolution to run through a third reconciliation process, if they want to. 

Fiscal years for the federal government begin on Oct. 1.