As the midterms approach, Republican and Democratic election officials are split over a powerful federal computer program at the center of President Donald Trump’s quest to expose noncitizen voters and compile lists of voting-age Americans.

A U.S. House Administration Committee hearing Thursday underscored the partisan divide over the Department of Homeland Security’s SAVE program. The online tool can verify U.S. citizenship by checking names against a host of government databases.

Republicans have embraced SAVE — Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements — as an effective new way to identify potential noncitizen voters. But Democrats have spurned it amid fears Trump is building a national voter database and concern that the program wrongly flags U.S. citizens.

Kansas Republican Secretary of State Scott Schwab and Minnesota Democratic Secretary of State Steve Simon staked out opposing views on SAVE during Thursday’s hearing. Purging noncitizens registered to vote is an ongoing focus of the Trump administration, though studies show noncitizen voting is extremely rare.

Kansas ran its voter roll through SAVE last year after the Trump administration refashioned the program, initially intended to check whether individual noncitizens are eligible for government benefits, into a citizenship verification tool and made it free for states. Schwab said SAVE had led Kansas to identify more than 5,500 registered voters who had died out of state.

“SAVE is one of the most important tools states have to verify voter information,” Schwab told the committee.

But Simon has previously raised concerns about the program. He signed a Dec. 1 letter with 11 other Democratic secretaries of state that said SAVE was likely to degrade rather than enhance state efforts to ensure free, fair and secure elections. The program is likely to misidentify eligible voters and chill voter participation, they wrote.

“I’m not throwing shade on my colleague, Secretary Schwab, but we have made the determination that it’s not yet ready for use in Minnesota,” Simon said Thursday, adding that Minnesota law doesn’t allow the use of SAVE.

Program central to Trump elections push

SAVE underpins Trump’s efforts to assert more White House power over federal elections, which under the U.S. Constitution are administered by states.

The Department of Justice is suing 29 states and the District of Columbia for access to their unredacted voter rolls, including sensitive personal data on voters, such as driver’s license and partial Social Security numbers. 

A Justice Department attorney said in federal court last month that the department has an agreement to share the information with Homeland Security for the purpose of identifying noncitizens.

Trump also signed an executive order last month that limits voting by mail and directs Homeland Security to compile lists of voting-age American citizens. The order says the lists will be derived from SAVE data, along with naturalization and Social Security records. At least five lawsuits have been filed against the order, including a challenge brought by Democratic state officials.

The White House is also pressuring Congress to pass the SAVE America Act, Trump’s signature elections proposal. The measure would require voters to provide documents proving their citizenship. Among its provisions is a requirement that states run their voter rolls through the SAVE program.

The House passed the bill in February. The Senate is debating a version of the legislation, which doesn’t appear to have enough votes to overcome a filibuster.

Nonprofit alternative available

“Election integrity is not a complicated issue. Only eligible voters should be casting ballots in our elections. One illegal vote is too many,” said Rep. Bryan Steil, a Wisconsin Republican and the House Administration Committee chair.

In January, Steil introduced the Make Elections Great Again Act, which contains similar provisions to the SAVE America Act but is more sweeping in its scope. It would impose additional limits on mail-in voting and require states to use SAVE to update voter lists every month.

Rep. Joe Morelle of New York, the ranking Democrat on the committee, suggested states already have effective options other than SAVE. He singled out ERIC, or the Electronic Registration Information Center, a nonprofit organization that allows states to compare voter registrations and other data to identify out-of-date registrations, deceased voters and in some cases possible illegal voting.

“I think it would probably be malpractice not to talk about Electronic Registration Information Center,” Morelle said.

Twenty-five states and the District of Columbia belong to ERIC. Some Republican-led states withdrew from the organization several years ago after Trump urged them to leave amid false conspiracy theories, which he helped promote, that the 2020 election was stolen from him.

Simon said ERIC offers “really good” data that provides tremendous value in helping to keep Minnesota’s voter roll up to date. 

“Good data is the coin of the realm here,” he said.

Kansas doesn’t participate in ERIC. Schwab, who is running for governor in Kansas’ Republican primary, said it would be a good tool but that it’s expensive.

ERIC charges new members a one-time $25,000 fee, in addition to annual dues approved by its board of directors, according to the organization’s bylaws. Larger states pay more each year than smaller ones, with annual dues ranging from roughly $37,000 to $117,000, its website says.

“We don’t have the resources to join,” Schwab said.

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.

WASHINGTON — U.S. Senate Majority Leader John Thune said Tuesday he plans to use the complex reconciliation process to fund immigration enforcement for the next three years, though it wasn’t immediately clear if House Republicans were on the exact same page.

The plan to fund Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the Border Patrol with only Republican votes could end the two-month shutdown at the Department of Homeland Security when combined with the regular funding bill for that department, which the Senate already approved but is stalled in the House. 

Thune, R-S.D., said during an afternoon press conference that House GOP leaders “could” add additional provisions to the reconciliation bill, but said he would like it to remain narrow. 

“My hope would be that if we can execute on getting that done here in the Senate, the House would be able to follow through,” he said. 

Thune said the Senate could vote as soon as next week on a budget resolution with reconciliation instructions. That is the first step of the complicated process. But the House must vote to adopt that budget resolution before Republicans can pass the funding bill for ICE and the Border Patrol.  

Speaker Mike Johnson’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment. 

Homeland Security shuttered

The Department of Homeland Security has been shut down since Feb. 14, after Democrats insisted on new guardrails for immigration enforcement following the fatal shootings of two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis by federal immigration officers.

Without any bipartisan consensus on how to do that, Republicans have instead decided to use the same reconciliation process they used last year to enact their “big, beautiful” law to approve funding for Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Border Patrol. 

The House would then likely pass DHS’ spending bill without those two line items, which the Senate has already approved. That would provide funding for the other agencies within the department, including the Coast Guard, Federal Emergency Management Agency, Secret Service and Transportation Security Administration.

Safeguards demanded

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said during a separate press conference that Democrats have repeatedly asked for “common sense” safeguards that would require immigration agents to show identification, prevent them from wearing masks and require judicial warrants to enter someone’s home. 

“The bottom line is these are simple. These are common sense,” he said. “They’re what every police department uses and when you ask the American people, they’re on our side. It’s the intransigence, particularly of the hard right, who seem to like what ICE is doing.”

Schumer said Democrats would use the marathon amendment voting session on both the budget resolution and the later reconciliation bill to hold Republicans’ “feet to the fire on DHS, on the war, on so many other issues.”

Thune said he has been “trying to figure out exactly” what Democrats have gotten out of the DHS shutdown, especially considering that immigration enforcement operations haven’t been affected since there was funding for that in last year’s reconciliation bill, exempting those programs from the funding lapse. 

“All of the things that the Democrats made this about, which was supposed to be reforms to the way that ICE and CBP operate. They got none of that. Zero,” he said, referring to Customs and Border Protection, the larger agency that includes the Border Patrol. “And now we’re going to fund those agencies for three years into the future.”

A large and diverse crowd packed a community center on Milwaukee’s  south side Thursday, calling for the release of Salah Sarsour, president of the Islamic Society of Milwaukee. Sarsour, who is of Palestinian descent, was detained by federal immigration agents Monday morning. His supporters are calling Sarsour’s arrest an targeted act of political retaliation designed to chill opposition to the Israeli government and support for the Palestinian people.

“This is a man who came to the United States and kind of lived the American dream,” Othman Atta, executive director of the Islamic Society of Milwaukee, told the audience of community members, press, activists, and local elected officials. “And they are trying to tarnish his image. They’re trying to target him.”

A green card holder and lawful permanent resident, Sarsour has lived in the United States for over 30 years. “The U.S. government fully vetted his visa application at that time,” Kathryn Brady, head of the Muslim Legal Fund of America’s Immigration Litigation Department, said in a statement Wednesday. Brady said that it’s difficult to believe that the federal government’s “position now is not rooted in a violation of his First Amendment right to speak about the suffering of Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank.”

Atta said that on Monday Sarsour stopped at an old warehouse on Milwaukee’s south side which he owned because mail kept arriving there. As he left, a car came on the wrong side of the street “flying toward him,” said Atta, forcing Sarsour to jump out of the way. The unmarked car stopped and a person allegedly in civilian clothes pointed a gun at Sarsour and asked who he was by name. 

Atta said 12 vehicles were involved in the arrest, and Sarsour was loaded into a van before being told he was being taken by federal immigration officers. 

Atta said that the story was relayed to Sarsour’s attorney Munjed Ahmad during a phone call in which Sarsour declared that he was a lion and willing to fight. Sarsour was transported to the Broadview Detention Center in Illinois before being quickly transferred to another facility in Indiana, Atta said.  

“This is America,” said Atta. “This is Trump’s America.” 

He described Sarsour as a husband, father, grandfather, and a successful business owner who has no criminal record or convictions. 

“According to the papers that were filed in immigration court, they went back to when he was a minor — a teenager — in the West Bank under Israeli occupation,” said Atta. 

When he was a teenager, Sarsour was arrested and detained by the Israeli police. “He served two years,” said Atta. “Many of you who know him know that his passion for Palestine, his passion for justice, was based on the experience he had and that his family and friends had. He would talk to us many times how for 80 straight days, he was interrogated, and brutalized, and tortured while he was in Israeli military custody.” 

Palestinians living both in the West Bank and the region of Gaza, which has suffered catastrophic damage and where tens of thousands of people have been killed during attacks by the Israeli government in the last two and a half years, have reported similar abuse. 

In 2024, the United Nations found that due process rights for Palestinians had been violated in the West Bank for nearly 60 years. Last year, charges were dropped against five Israeli soldiers accused of beating and sexually abusing a Palestinian prisoner in an assault that was captured in a video. A top legal official in the Israeli military admitted to approving the video’s release in an effort to show the world how the over 9,000 Palestinians detained by Israel are treated, the Associated Press reported. 

Al Jazeera reported that the bodies of Palestinians released as part of a ceasefire deal between Israel and militant factions of Hamas exhibited signs of torture including restraints and injuries still evident on the dead. 

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said in a statement Thursday that Sarsour was convicted of throwing Molotov cocktails at the homes of Israeli armed forces.” In the statement, which repeatedly called Sarsour a “terrorist” and an “illegal alien from Jordan,” DHS charged that he “lied” on his green card application to enter the country in 1993 during the Clinton administration, and that his first attempts to apply for an immigrant visa at the American consulate in Jerusalem were rebuffed because of those allegations and others of “illegally attempting to possess” weapons and ammunition. 

Atta and Sarsour’s supportive community urged onlookers Thursday not to forget the reports about Israel’s treatment of Palestinians. 

Atta said that Sarsour was again detained by the Israeli government after returning in 1995, which is where the weapons allegations came from, and that the written charges were in Hebrew, “which he doesn’t read or understand.”

Sarsour’s son, Kareem, was joined by other members of his family Thursday. Over the last two days, the family has been “bombarded” with “thousands of messages from all the people who knew him saying what he meant to them as a father-figure, as a role model, as a beloved community member, it just tells you who he was,” said Kareem Sarsour. Kareem described his father as “always giving” and said that Sarsour had tried to give his children everything he couldn’t have when he lived in the West Bank. 

The crowd that assembled to support Sarsour and his family included many Muslim residents, local activists, and elected officials, with Milwaukee County Executive David Crowley and  Mayor Cavalier Johnson in the front row, and further back, Alds. JoCasta Zamarripa and Alex Brower. Christine Neumann-Oriz, executive director of Voces de la Frontera, was in the audience, and speakers from Jewish Voice for Peace joined Muslim and Christian faith leaders in denouncing Sarsour’s detention and calling for his release.

A flurry of Wisconsin lawmakers and local officials have condemned Sarsour’s arrest. Sen. Chris Larson (D-Milwaukee) said in a statement that the federal government was “increasingly fascist”  and called Sarsour “a vocal advocate for a free and independent Palestinian State.” 

“We have already seen numerous Muslim activists unfairly and unlawfully targeted by the Trump Administration for their beliefs and their speech,” Larson wrote. “These Unconstitutional assaults on our freedoms should alarm all of us. When any individual or group is targeted by the government for their speech, all of our freedoms are threatened.” 

Congresswoman Gwen Moore called Sarsour’s detention “completely unacceptable.” “Salah Sarsour is a respected leader in the Milwaukee community, and his detention raises serious concerns about the continued targeting of lawful residents based on the color of their skin or their political beliefs,” she said.

Rep. Ryan Clancy (D-Milwaukee) charged that Sarsour’s detention was an attack on free speech. “Until free expression and free speech are protected, not treated as a privilege of the Trump Administration’s loudest supporters, this openly fascist government should be neither trusted nor obeyed,” Clancy said in a statement. “We must abolish ICE and hold those responsible for these repeated acts of state violence accountable.” 

Statements supporting Sarsour were also put out by the Council on American-Islamic Relations, the Mandela Barnes for governor campaign, and the Milwaukee Area Labor Council Immigrant Rights Committee. 

Ahmad said that he’s “shocked” at how many communications he’s received from attorneys around the country on Sarsour’s case. “We have assembled a very capable legal team, that legal team continues to grow,” said Ahmad, declaring that they will work to free Sarsour. A hearing is scheduled on April 18. 

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President Donald Trump signed a sweeping executive order on Tuesday that attempts to restrict mail-in voting, a White House priority certain to face significant legal challenges.

The order directs the U.S. Department of Homeland Security along with the Social Security Administration to compile a list of voting-age American citizens in each state and share it with state election officials. The order also requires the U.S. Postal Service to only send and receive ballots that include tracking barcodes.

Trump’s order represents a major escalation in his effort to assert presidential control over elections, which under the U.S. Constitution are administered by the states. Trump last year attempted to unilaterally impose a proof of citizenship requirement to vote in federal elections in an executive order that was blocked in federal court.

The move also reflects a long-held focus by Trump and his allies on noncitizen voters. Studies have shown noncitizen voting is extremely rare.

“I think this will help a lot with elections,” Trump said.

National database of adult citizens

Homeland Security operates the SAVE system, a powerful computer program that can verify citizenship. 

DHS has previously invited states to run their voter rolls through SAVE, which flags voters as potential noncitizens. Some election officials criticize the system, saying it wrongly identifies U.S. citizens as possibly ineligible.

The U.S. Department of Justice as recently as last week denied any efforts to create a national voter registration list. While the executive order does not explicitly mandate the creation of a voter list, it essentially marks an effort by the White House to create a national database of adult U.S. citizens.

The order requires Homeland Security to enable states to routinely supplement or suggest changes to each state’s citizenship list. Federal officials would also be required to allow individuals to access their own records and update or correct them ahead of elections.

Under the executive order, the postmaster general must propose rules to require all outbound ballot mail to be sent in an envelope that includes a barcode for tracking. The order also requires that states must inform the U.S. Postal Service at least 90 days before federal elections whether they intend to allow ballots to be sent through the mail.

“Instead of focusing on lowering the cost of energy, groceries, and health care, Donald Trump is desperately attempting to take over and rig our elections and avoid accountability in November,” U.S. Sen. Alex Padilla, a California Democrat, said in a statement shortly after Trump announced the order. “This executive order is a blatant, unconstitutional abuse of power.”

SAVE America Act

Trump has pushed Congress to pass the SAVE America Act, which would require individuals to produce documents, such as a passport or birth certificate, proving their citizenship in order to register to vote. The U.S. Senate is debating the bill, but it appears unlikely to have enough support to overcome a filibuster.

Trump has repeatedly asked Republicans to add three provisions to the bill, including restrictions on mail-in voting, with exceptions for members of the military, people who are ill and those on vacation. 

The president has also previously promised to advance voting restrictions, with or without Congress. Earlier this month, Trump voted by mail in Florida.

The executive order directs the Justice Department and other federal agencies to withhold federal funds from non-compliant states and localities “where such withholding is authorized by law.” 

Tuesday’s order is certain to face legal challenges. The Constitution gives Congress — not the president by executive order — the power to override state election regulations.

Marc Elias, a prominent voting rights litigator, promised to fight the executive order.

“If Trump signs an unconstitutional Executive Order to take over voting, we will sue,” Elias wrote on social media. “I don’t bluff and I usually win.”

Republican National Committee Chairman Joe Gruters praised the order, saying Trump was restoring voter confidence. “Protecting America’s ballot box isn’t optional – it’s the foundation of our republic,” Grunters said.

DOJ lawsuits against states

The Justice Department has sued 29 states and the District of Columbia for copies of their voter rolls that contain sensitive personal information on voters, such as driver’s licenses and partial Social Security numbers. About a dozen states have voluntarily provided the data, but most are fighting the demands in court.

Three federal judges have so far ruled against the Justice Department. The administration is appealing and in court documents has argued that swift court decisions are necessary to ensure the security and fairness of the midterms.

The Trump administration has said the data is necessary to verify only citizens are registered to vote. Last week, a Justice Department lawyer confirmed in court that voter data would be shared with Homeland Security.

“Some may freak out about this, but honestly, this is hilarious,” David Becker, executive director of the nonpartisan Center for Election Innovation & Research and a former U.S. Department of Justice Voting Section attorney, wrote on social media about the Trump order. 

“It’s clearly unconstitutional, will be blocked immediately, and the only thing it will accomplish is to make liberal lawyers wealthier. He might as well sign an EO banning gravity.”

Jennifer Shutt contributed to this report.

Mukta Joshi, an investigative reporter at Mississippi Today, is a New York Times Local Investigations fellow examining the ICE detention facility at Adams County Correctional Center. States Newsroom is partnering with Mississippi Today and The New York Times on this project. Mukta can be reached at mukta.joshi@nytimes.com. You can read the entire series here.

The Adams County Correctional Center, one of more than 200 ICE detention facilities in the U.S., is located near the city of Natchez on a sprawling 14-acre site in southwestern Mississippi.

The facility, which holds more than 2,000 people, is a significant economic driver in a county of fewer than 30,000 residents. CoreCivic employs approximately 400 people there, making it one of the largest employers in Adams County. Natchez Mayor Dan Gibson said CoreCivic is the county’s single largest taxpayer.

The federal government sets strict limits on who can visit Immigration and Custom Enforcement detention centers. And nearly all of them are run by for-profit companies, making the details of their operation private and difficult to monitor. 

So far, this is what we know.

Who owns it?

The Adams facility is privately owned and operated by CoreCivic Inc., a publicly traded company based in Tennessee. 

One of the largest private prison companies in the country, it disclosed in its most recent financial filings that it owns or controls about 57% of all privately owned prison beds in the U.S. 

The company, which reported $2.2 billion in revenue last year, has benefited financially from the Trump administration’s push to arrest immigrants. From 2024 to 2025, revenue increased by nearly $200 million thanks largely to an increase in ICE detentions, according to the company’s latest annual report.

Over the past few years, CoreCivic, its employees and PACs have poured millions of dollars into political donations and lobbying. In the 2024 election cycle, 84% of these donations went to Republican candidates. In the same cycle, CoreCivic spent more than $1.7 million lobbying, according to OpenSecrets. The previous year, it spent more than $1.6 million.

The Adams County facility is one of two ICE facilities operated by CoreCivic in the state. A second CoreCivic facility in Tutwiler, in northern Mississippi, was authorized last year to start housing ICE detainees.

What kinds of people are detained there? 

The Adams facility is a men’s facility. Most of its detainees are not from Mississippi. They were picked up by ICE agents somewhere else and are being held here until they decide to leave the country, or until an immigration judge deports them or sets them free.

Being in the U.S. without proper documentation is a civil infraction, like a speeding ticket – not a criminal violation. This fact has contributed to controversy about prison-like conditions that people detained by ICE are experiencing.

Only 9% of people in the Adams center have any sort of criminal conviction. But even those with criminal records are being held for civil immigration infractions, not as punishment. 

In addition to men, the facility currently houses a small number of transgender women. Following President Trump’s 2025 executive order, transgender people are required to be incarcerated in facilities that align with their gender assigned at birth, regardless of their legal status.

How long are detainees held?

In early 2025, then-warden Jason Streeval was quoted by the Natchez Democrat as saying that the average stay in the facility was about 60 days but had been getting longer. He told the newspaper that some detainees had been there for as long as seven months. 

Has the facility ever been the subject of controversy? 

The Adams facility made headlines in 2012, when an inmate protest against poor conditions snowballed into a riot that resulted in the killing of a guard. The FBI opened an investigation, leading to a number of inmates being charged and ultimately sentenced for participating in the riot. In the wake of the riot, U.S. Rep. Bennie Thompson called for an investigation into CoreCivic, then operating as Corrections Corporation of America.

One section of the facility, known as the “Zulu” unit, contains solitary confinement cells, where detainees are housed as punishment. In 2020, two nonprofit groups submitted a written complaint to ICE and the Department of Homeland Security alleging that immigrants from Cameroon had been tortured by ICE officers in that ward and forced to sign deportation documents. A year later, the complaint was still unresolved, according to the Center for Constitutional Rights. A representative for ICE did not respond to an inquiry about the current status of the complaint.

In 2021, an inspection by DHS found that Adams generally had provided sufficient medical care but identified one case in which the medical unit examined a sick detainee but did not send the person to the hospital. The detainee died. 

DHS also found that Adams didn’t meet other federal standards. Among the cited failures: It did not respond to grievances in a timely manner, it inadequately implemented COVID-19 safety protocols and it failed to assist vulnerable detainees. The ACLU called for the facility to be shut down.

What’s life like inside? 

The facility is divided into units, each holding about 140 people who share eight toilets and 15 showers, according to detainees interviewed by Mississippi Today. While inside, detainees can work if they choose, helping to clean, run the kitchen or do laundry. Several people held at the center said they were paid about $3.50 per day for their work.

Detainees are generally restricted to their own unit, where they can move about freely. One detainee said he was allowed to visit a secure outdoor area once every four or five days.

Several detainees described harsh conditions, but said that they had spent time in other facilities that were far dirtier and more restrictive. 

We don’t know much beyond that, especially about what the detention center looks like inside. A detainee who can afford the fees can send messages and make video calls from inside. They can’t send photos or attachments. And the communication app blurs their background and obscures the video completely if the camera is aimed away from the detainee’s face during a call.

How much does it cost to run? 

The contract to run this facility, like most other ICE detention centers, is an “Intragovernmental Service Agreement” between ICE, CoreCivic and Adams County. The 2019 agreement shows that ICE had agreed to pay a $3.9 million monthly flat rate for the facility, an amount set to increase every year. There have since been changes to this contract, but they were not immediately accessible. 

When we requested an interview with the warden and assistant warden, a spokesperson for CoreCivic redirected us to the company’s public affairs office and requested us to send our questions in writing. 

Over the next few months, we plan to publish weekly dispatches about the facility and about ICE detention in Mississippi and do our best to address these unanswered questions. You’ll be able to find my reporting on the Mississippi Today website, on our social media channels and in our Friday newsletter. And you can follow me on X @mukta_jo.

In the meantime, please fill out our survey. If you know something about the detention center, if you know someone who works there or is detained there, or want me to find out something about it for readers, please get in touch.

Clarification 3/27/26: This story has been updated to clarify the types of detainees held in the Adams County Correctional Center.

The U.S. Department of Justice confirmed in court Thursday that it is sharing sensitive voter data with the Department of Homeland Security in a search for noncitizen voters. But a DOJ lawyer denied the department is building a national voter database.

The Justice Department has demanded states provide full copies of their voter lists, including sensitive personal information, such as driver’s license and partial Social Security numbers. It has sued 29 states and the District of Columbia for refusing to turn over the data. At least a dozen other states have provided their lists.

During a hearing in the Justice Department’s lawsuit seeking Rhode Island’s voter data, DOJ attorney Eric Neff said the information would be shared with Homeland Security. U.S. District Court Judge Mary McElroy had asked whether the Justice Department could send the list to Homeland Security with instructions to search for noncitizens.

“Yes, and we intend to do so,” Neff said.

He added that the Justice Department and Homeland Security already have a “use agreement” in place for such sharing.

Three federal judges have so far rejected the Justice Department’s demands for state voter data, and no judge has sided with the department. DOJ has appealed those decisions and oral arguments are scheduled for later this spring after the Trump administration pushed for quick decisions ahead of the midterm elections.

The Justice Department has said it needs the voter data to determine whether states are complying with federal voting rights laws that require states to regularly update and clean their lists. The department has voiced particular determination to root out non-citizen voting, which is extremely rare.

In September, Homeland Security told Stateline in an unsigned statement that the Justice Department was sharing voter data with the agency in a collaborative effort.

But Neff’s courtroom statement on Thursday appeared to mark the first on-record acknowledgment of the data sharing. CBS News also reported on Thursday that the two agencies were nearing a final agreement on sharing voter data for immigration and criminal investigations.

The Justice Department and Homeland Security didn’t respond to requests for comment from Stateline.

In recent weeks, a Justice Department lawyer sidestepped a question about whether voter data would be used for immigration purposes. On March 3 during a hearing in a lawsuit over Minnesota’s voter roll, U.S. District Court Judge Katherine Menendez asked DOJ lawyer James Tucker whether there was intention to use the data for immigration enforcement.

“Not to my knowledge, no, your honor, not with the data we are getting,” Tucker said, according to a transcript. But he added that some federal prosecutors were working with Homeland Security.

During a federal court hearing in Maine on Thursday, Tucker said the Justice Department was not creating a national voter database. At the same time, he didn’t rule out voter data being checked against federal databases.

“Again, that’s something that’s been routine the United States has done in the past,” Tucker said.

Since President Donald Trump took office last year, Homeland Security has refashioned an online program previously used to verify whether immigrants qualified for government benefits into a tool that can verify U.S. citizenship. Called SAVE, the program is capable of checking millions of voters against federal databases for citizenship information.

DHS has encouraged states to run their voter lists through the program. Some Democratic state election officials have expressed concerns about the program and point to instances where SAVE has wrongly flagged a voter as a potential noncitizen.

“They are initiating litigation in states all around the country, seeking the same information in sort of this cookie-cutter way,” Jonathan Bolton, an attorney in the Maine Attorney General’s Office, said during Thursday’s federal court hearing in Maine.

“Which suggests that the purpose is not to investigate specific concerns about specific states, but it is to compile this sort of national voter registration database,” Bolton said.

Bolton was representing Maine Democratic Secretary of State Shenna Bellows in the Justice Department’s lawsuit for Maine’s voter roll.

Rhode Island Current reporter Alexander Castro contributed reporting. Stateline reporter Jonathan Shorman can be reached at jshorman@stateline.org.

WASHINGTON — Senate Democratic leaders on Thursday were reading through a new Republican offer to fund the Department of Homeland Security that could end the shutdown that began nearly six weeks ago, with a congressional recess set to begin.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., said in the afternoon that Democrats hadn’t “responded officially” to a proposal GOP negotiators sent over in the morning but that discussions were ongoing. He described it as the “last and final” offer.

“There are some language requests that they made that we did everything we could to accommodate,” he said. 

Delaware Democratic Sen. Chris Coons said “it’s a good sign that there is paper going back and forth,” though he said the two political parties are still somewhat far apart.

“I think there’s a lot of sense of urgency around getting TSA funded,” he said, referring to the Transportation Security Administration and long wait times at some of the nation’s airports. Some unpaid TSA officers are calling out sick, causing jams in security lines.

“But frankly, we’re not that far from where we’ve been for weeks, which is, Democrats want real reforms to ICE and CBP and are resistant to funding them without reforms, and Republicans would like us to fund them without reforms beyond what Secretary Noem committed to,” Coons said, referring to the Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection agencies.

Some Republican senators, he said, view the confirmation of former Oklahoma Republican Sen. Markwayne Mullin earlier this week as a form of compromise on DHS’ immigration enforcement activities. Mullin replaced the former secretary, Kristi Noem.

That, however, isn’t enough for Democrats.

“My Republican friends on this topic have said, ‘Hey, Secretary Mullin in his confirmation committed to A, B, C, D,’” Coons said. “And that’s a far cry from, ‘We’ll put it in statute or we have promulgated this in regulation.’ So that’s some of the problems. I think they feel like they’ve already offered key reforms in Secretary Mullin’s confirmation. And at least the senators that I’ve talked to don’t think that’s enough.”

Virginia Democratic Sen. Mark Warner said there is “a conundrum” over how to provide more funding for Customs and Border Protection “without some agreement that they need to go back to their statutory role, not doing interior enforcement.”

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., had not commented publicly on the latest Republican offer as of late afternoon. 

Trump vows ‘very drastic measures’

President Donald Trump said during a morning Cabinet meeting at the White House that he wants to see a deal to fund DHS soon, but didn’t disclose any details of the latest offer.  

“They need to end the shutdown immediately, or we’ll have to take some very drastic measures,” he said, opting not to elaborate on what he meant. 

Thune said he’d leave the White House to speak for Trump on whether he supports the latest Republican DHS funding offer but added that administration staff have “been involved in the back-and-forth that has occurred overnight and all morning.”

“It’s never done until it’s done,” he said. 

Timing on a deal to fund DHS is somewhat important, with the House scheduled to depart Friday for a two-week spring break that their Senate colleagues are supposed to leave for as well. 

Thune said the chamber will likely head off for the recess if they fund DHS, but suspects “we’ll probably be around here” if they don’t.  

Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., didn’t commit to put a reworked DHS appropriations bill on the House floor, especially if it doesn’t include funding for ICE’s Enforcement and Removal Operations.

“We have never been in favor of breaking the bill up,” he said. 

But Johnson said it may be possible for Republicans to move funding for that specific program through the complex budget reconciliation process, which the party used last year to approve tens of billions in additional funding for immigration enforcement and deportation in its “big, beautiful” law.  

“If they break away that subset, I suppose we’d have to fund it through reconciliation and find some other means,” he said. 

Working without pay

Workers at the several agencies within DHS, including the Federal Emergency Management Agency and Secret Service, will continue to work without pay until Congress brokers some sort of funding deal for the department.

Any federal employee who handles national security issues or the protection of life or property keeps working during a shutdown. All others are supposed to be sent home. Everyone is supposed to get back pay once the shutdown ends. 

TSA airport security screeners this weekend will miss their second full paycheck since the funding lapse began, after seeing only a partial paycheck early in the shutdown.

While TSA workers are required to work without pay during a shutdown, thousands have called in sick over the last six weeks as they seek gig work and other ways to pay bills. Call-out rates nationwide reached double digits this week, with some airports seeing more than 40% of employees miss shifts.

Some TSA workers have turned to selling plasma to make ends meet, officials from the union representing the agency’s employees told reporters Tuesday.

The staffing shortages have led to hours-long waits at security lines in some highly trafficked airports, causing passengers to miss flights and generally adding to the anxiety of air travel.

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said in a statement that the administration “is having discussions about a number of ideas to blunt the impact of the Democrat shutdown crisis, but no preparations or plans are currently underway. The best and easiest way to pay TSA Agents is to fund DHS.” 

Jacob Fischler contributed to this report. 

WASHINGTON — Alan Armstrong, a Tulsa businessman, was sworn in Tuesday as Oklahoma’s newest U.S. senator.

Armstrong temporarily fills the seat of Markwayne Mullin, who was sworn in as U.S. Department of Homeland Security secretary earlier Tuesday. 

The Senate on Monday confirmed Mullin’s nomination to lead the agency responsible for carrying out President Donald Trump’s mass deportation agenda. 

Armstrong was sworn in at the U.S. Capitol just hours after Oklahoma GOP Gov. Kevin Stitt appointed him to the post Tuesday morning at the Oklahoma state Capitol in Oklahoma City. 

Iowa GOP Sen. Chuck Grassley, who serves as president pro tempore of the Senate, swore in Armstrong. Grassley joined Armstrong and his family in the Old Senate Chamber for a reenactment of the swearing-in shortly after. 

Armstrong has served as executive chairman of the board of directors for Williams. The major energy company is headquartered in Tulsa. 

Armstrong joins Oklahoma GOP Sen. James Lankford in the Senate and will serve alongside him until January 2027 — the remainder of Mullin’s term. 

Under Oklahoma law, Armstrong signed an affidavit earlier Tuesday vowing to not run for a full Senate term in 2026, the Oklahoma Voice reported. 

Earlier in March, Trump gave Oklahoma GOP U.S. Rep. Kevin Hern — who is running in November for the Senate seat — his “complete and total endorsement.” 

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump hailed his new Homeland Security head, former U.S. Sen. Markwayne Mullin, as “strong, professional and fair” during an Oval Office swearing-in ceremony Tuesday.

Mullin, who until Monday was one of Oklahoma’s Republican senators, takes the reins at the Department of Homeland Security amid a weekslong partial shutdown in the aftermath of two high-profile fatal shootings of U.S. citizens by two departmental agencies.

Mullin, accompanied by family at the Oval Office ceremony, described his swearing-in as “surreal” and “humbling” during brief remarks after Attorney General Pam Bondi administered his oath of office.

“I made this very clear that I don’t care what color your state is. I don’t care if you’re red or you’re blue. At the end of the day, my job is to be secretary of Homeland and to protect everybody the same. And we will do that. I’ll fight every single day,” Mullin said. 

The partial shutdown has snarled major airports nationwide as thousands of Transportation Security Administration personnel, part of DHS, have quit or skipped work in the absence of paychecks.

Mullin said he met with many DHS employees Tuesday, noting they had been working without pay for more than a month because of “politics.”

Former fighter

Trump praised Mullin at Tuesday’s ceremony.

“I have no doubt that as he takes the helm of DHS, Markwayne will fight for Homeland Security, the United States and securing the country and making it really strong and the way it should be,” Trump said. “Our country’s come a long way in the last year.”

In rising to the role, Mullin became the first member of the Cherokee Nation to serve in the president’s Cabinet, a fact Trump said he “didn’t know.”

Mullin, an award-winning wrestler and former professional mixed martial arts fighter, began his Senate term in 2023. Until being elected as senator, he represented Oklahoma’s 2nd Congressional District starting in 2013.

Mullin resigned from the U.S. Senate Monday evening following the body’s confirmation of his appointment in a 54-45 vote.

The former senator, who will be tasked with leading a department of 260,000 employees, has not sat on a committee that handles policy for Homeland Security.

Alan Armstrong, a Tulsa businessman, was sworn in Tuesday to replace Mullin in the Senate.

Department in turmoil

Mullin replaces former Secretary Kristi Noem who, since Trump’s second term began, oversaw the president’s mass deportation crackdown and publicly flaunted her role in ad campaigns and public appearances — including being photographed while touring a notorious mega-prison in El Salvador where the U.S. deported hundreds of migrants against a judge’s order. 

Noem notably immediately defended two fatal shootings by department personnel in Minneapolis when Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents killed 37-year-old Renee Good on Jan. 7, and Customs and Border Patrol agents killed Alex Pretti, also 37, on Jan. 24.

Democrats have refused to fully fund DHS unless Republicans agreed to new policies for immigration enforcement — including banning face coverings on agents, mandating body camera usage and requiring judicial warrants. 

“The department that Markwayne takes over today is currently shut down by radical left Democrat thugs in Congress who have blocked all funding for DHS because they’re trying to shield illegal aliens, criminals and gang members,” Trump said, incorrectly stating that all DHS funding has been blocked. 

While a significant number of DHS employees, like TSA officers, have been working for weeks without pay, both ICE and Customs and Border Protection are fully funded under a new influx of cash Republicans approved in July as part of the massive tax and spending package.

Speaking to reporters following Mullin’s swearing-in, Trump declined to talk in detail about negotiations with the Senate to end the partial shutdown.  

“They’re working on all of that,” he said.

WASHINGTON — U.S. Supreme Court justices seemed split Tuesday on whether the Trump administration should be allowed to turn away asylum-seekers who present themselves at ports of entry at the U.S.-Mexico border.

The question presented to the justices was whether migrants have to fully cross into the United States in order to have the right to apply for asylum and be processed, or if they can apply for asylum when they appear at a port of entry while on Mexico’s side of the border. 

The policy requiring a full crossing, known as metering, is defunct, but the Trump administration is asking the high court to make a determination in order to potentially revive the practice for future use at the southern border.

“This is an important tool in the government’s toolbox for dealing with border surges when they occur,” Vivek Suri, assistant to the U.S. solicitor general, told the court during oral arguments on the asylum case. “I can’t predict when the next border surge occurs, but I can say that when it does occur, this is a tool that (the Department of Homeland Security) would want in its toolbox. It’s not something the court should leave to future uncertainty.”

The six conservative justices seemed to agree with the Trump administration’s position, and questioned the definition of when a migrant “arrives” in the United States and can therefore seek asylum — legal protection granted to those fleeing danger or persecution in their home country.

The three liberals of the Supreme Court — Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson —  asked whether the policy violated federal law protecting refugees. 

Lower and appeals courts have repeatedly blocked the metering policy, finding it violated U.S. asylum and refugee law for those escaping persecution after the first Trump administration expanded its use in 2017. The Biden administration rescinded the policy in 2021. 

A 2020 investigation by the Department of Homeland Security’s Office of Inspector General found that up to 680 migrants per day were turned around as a result of the metering policy. 

The ‘magic thing’

Conservative Justice Amy Coney Barrett asked Kelsi Corkran, an attorney who argued on behalf of the immigrant legal aid and humanitarian group Al Otro Lado, how close an asylum seeker has to be to qualify as “arriving” in the U.S.

The immigration advocacy group originally brought the challenge in 2017 after asylum seekers were turned away by border officials at U.S. ports of entry. 

“What is the magic thing, or the dispositive thing, that we’re looking for, where we say, ‘Ah, now that person we can say arrives in the United States?’” Barrett asked. 

Corkran said someone arrives in the U.S. at a port of entry “when they are at the threshold of the port’s entrance, about to step over.” 

“I think that’s consistent with ordinary meaning,” she said. “I arrive at my house, or I arrive in my yard, when I’m going through the gate. Now that process of arriving is interrupted by the border officer physically blocking them from completing the arrival.”

Barrett also asked Suri if the Trump administration plans to reinstate the metering policy. 

Suri said the Trump administration would like to, “when border conditions justify.”

Jackson noted the policy, in practice, would require an asylum seeker to violate U.S. immigration law by entering into the country without authorization, based on the Trump administration’s argument that a migrant has to be on U.S. soil before making an asylum claim. 

That would be considered entering the U.S. unlawfully.

“So imagine a polite asylum seeker who wants to do everything by the book, he approaches the border but does not cross precisely because the law says you are not supposed to enter the United States without authority,” Jackson said. “If we’re trying to think about what ‘arriving in’ means, surely Congress was contemplating that a person would be coming to the United States, would be doing so with an intent to comply with the law that says you’re not supposed to enter, and thereby asking for entry.” 

Justice Brett Kavanaugh also questioned Suri about how the policy seems to give preference to migrants to enter the U.S. without authorization, rather than those who are seeking to make an asylum claim. 

Suri said the metering policy doesn’t prevent a migrant from seeking asylum. 

“It’s saying ‘our port (of entry) is at capacity today, try again some other day,’ and that time when that person comes in, that person could come in legally,” he said. 

Refugee laws

Sotomayor questioned Suri how the metering policy didn’t violate the United Nations Refugee Convention of 1951. That act, which the U.S. signed in 1967, was created after the M.S. St. Louis ship, carrying more than 900 Jewish refugees during World War II, was prevented entry to the U.S. and turned back to Europe. 

Some passengers were able to find refuge in other countries, but 254 died in the Holocaust.

Suri said the metering policy doesn’t send people back to their home country. 

“No, you’re just telling them to walk back,” Sotomayor said, adding that if the turn-back policy were applied to the Jewish refugees on the St. Louis, it would be the same as telling them to swim back. 

“They happened to be on a boat, but that’s what we did,” she said. “We didn’t let them dock. We didn’t consider whether they were being persecuted. And the majority of those people were shipped back or had to go back from where they came and were killed. That’s what we’re doing here, isn’t it?”

Suri said that he does “not deny the moral weight of claims made by refugees, but that is not the question before the court.”

He said the issue is whether Congress imposed the obligation “in the asylum and inspection statutes, and those refer only to aliens who arrive in the United States.”

Sotomayor pushed back and noted that if someone were to fly into LaGuardia Airport in New York, they “may not have put their foot on U.S. land, but they’ve arrived in the United States. They’re knocking on the door.” 

The justices are likely to make a decision on the case by late June. 

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Senate voted Monday evening to confirm Markwayne Mullin to lead the Department of Homeland Security, which is responsible for carrying out President Donald Trump’s mass deportation agenda. 

The 54-45 vote means that Mullin, a Republican senator from Oklahoma, will take over the department in the midst of a five-week shutdown. He will replace outgoing Secretary Kristi Noem, whom the president reassigned to another role in the administration.

Mullin voted for himself. Democratic Sens. John Fetterman of Pennsylvania and Martin Heinrich of New Mexico were the only Democrats to back Mullin’s confirmation.

Just before the Senate adjourned, Mullin submitted his resignation letter.

The department has been shut down since mid-February while Democrats have called for restraints on federal immigration agents after officers killed two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis. On Jan. 7, Renee Good was shot and killed by an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent and on Jan. 24, Alex Pretti was pinned down and killed by Customs and Border Protection officers.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune, Republican of South Dakota, said on the Senate floor before the vote Monday that Mullin will be entering DHS at a difficult time. 

“It’s a tough assignment, made all the more challenging right now by Democrats having shut DHS down for five weeks,” Thune said. “We all know that Markwayne isn’t afraid of a challenge.”

Speaking to reporters early Monday, Trump said that Mullin is “gonna be fantastic” as DHS secretary. 

As an enrolled member of the Cherokee Nation, Mullin will be the first Indigenous DHS secretary. 

Shutdown effects

Though DHS is shuttered, ICE and CBP are still fully funded because the Republican-led Congress last year passed a separate funding stream of $175 billion for immigration enforcement. 

Trump over the weekend directed his administration to place ICE agents in several airports in an attempt to aid Transportation Security Administration agents, who are working without pay. ICE and TSA are both agencies within DHS.

Mullin does not have any experience on a committee that handles policy for Homeland Security and will be tasked with leading a department of 260,000 employees.

Some senators have raised concerns about Mullin’s temperament, citing a 2023 incident in which he physically challenged a witness before Congress. Mullin also expressed sympathy toward a man who attacked Sen. Rand Paul, breaking six of the Kentucky Republican’s ribs and damaging a lung. 

Paul, who chairs the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, voted against advancing Mullin’s nomination to the Senate floor. Paul also voted against Mullin’s confirmation Monday night. 

The Senate advanced Mullin’s nomination in a 54-37 procedural vote Sunday. Two Democrats, Pennsylvania’s John Fetterman and New Mexico’s Martin Heinrich, joined all Republicans who voted Sunday. Paul did not vote on Sunday. 

Airport security workers missed work Monday at the highest rate since a partial government shutdown began in mid-February, the Department of Homeland Security said, and the Trump administration sent immigration officials to some airports in an attempt to keep lines moving.

Travelers reported hourslong security lines at major airports in Atlanta and Houston, while waits of 30 minutes or more were reported at several other hubs Monday.

Nearly 3,500 Transportation Security Administration agents, roughly 11.8% of the scheduled nationwide workforce, called out from work Monday. TSA officers have been working without pay since the department that oversees TSA began a funding lapse Feb. 14 due to a dispute in Congress over immigration enforcement.

Call out rates were over 20% at a handful of major airports, according to DHS. They were:

• 42.3% in New Orleans
• 41.5% in Atlanta
• 39.1% in Houston
• 38.1% in Baltimore
• 37.4% at New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport
• 24.7% in Pittsburgh
• 24.2% in Philadelphia
• 21.7% at New York’s Laguardia Airport
• 20.3% in Phoenix

ICE to airports

More than 400 TSA workers have quit since the “pointless, reckless shutdown” began, DHS spokeswoman Lauren Bis said in an emailed statement. 

Bis blamed the shutdown and related problems with air security staffing on Democrats in Congress, and confirmed DHS would send officers from Immigration and Customs Enforcement, another DHS agency, to assist TSA at airports.

TSA officers “are not able to afford gas, childcare, food, or rent,” she said. 

“While the Democrats continue to put the safety, dependability, and ease of our air travel at risk, President Trump is taking action to deploy hundreds of ICE officers, that are currently funded by Congress, to airports being adversely impacted. This will help bolster TSA efforts to keep our skies safe and minimize air travel disruptions.”

President Donald Trump praised ICE in comments to reporters Monday morning and suggested he could also call upon National Guard troops to help at airports.

“They stepped in so, so strongly,” he said of ICE officers. “They’ll do great. And if that’s not enough, I’ll bring in the National Guard.”

Tom Homan, the White House border czar who coordinates much of Trump’s immigration enforcement agenda, said in a Sunday interview on CNN’s “State of the Union” that ICE officers would primarily handle duties that did not require extensive training, such as making sure no one entered secure areas through exits.

“We’re simply there to help TSA do their job in areas that don’t need their specialized expertise,” he said, rather than screening through the X-ray machines, he told CNN’s Dana Bash. “But there are roles we can play to release TSA officers from the non-significant role, such as guarding an exit, so they can get back to the scanning machines and move people quicker.”

DHS declined to provide a list of airports to which ICE would deploy, citing “operational security” concerns.

ICE officers were spotted at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, the nation’s busiest, where waits of four hours in security lines were reported on Monday.

Shutdown persists

Federal law requires TSA officers to work, even during a shutdown, though they will not be paid until funding is restored.

Despite being at the center of the shutdown debate, ICE has not been affected by the DHS funding lapse because Republicans provided the agency massive funding in the tax cuts and spending bill they passed along party lines last year.

Democrats have refused to fund a fiscal 2026 appropriations bill for the department without major changes to the administration’s immigration enforcement, which reached a tipping point following the deaths of two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis in January.

“Because of the Democrat shutdown, President Trump is using every tool available to help American travelers who are facing hours long lines at airports across the country—especially during this spring break and holiday season that is very important for many American families,” Bis said.

In a rare weekend session, the U.S. Senate again failed to advance a funding measure for DHS on Saturday.

Deadly LaGuardia crash

The pilot and co-pilot of an Air Canada plane died, and more than 40 people were injured, after the jet collided with a fire truck at LaGuardia airport late Sunday.

The incident was unrelated to problems with TSA, which is not responsible for safety on runways or elsewhere outside of airport terminals, but it further delayed and complicated travel in the New York City area.

Ashley Murray contributed to this report.

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Senate voted Sunday to advance Oklahoma GOP Sen. Markwayne Mullin’s nomination to lead the Department of Homeland Security.

The 54-37 procedural vote sets up a final vote on Mullin’s confirmation as early as Monday. Democratic Sen. John Fetterman of Pennsylvania voted to advance Mullin, after backing him in committee as well. Also voting with Republicans was Democratic Sen. Martin Heinrich of New Mexico.

If confirmed, Mullin will take over a department that has been shut down since Feb. 14 amid a stalemate over changes to immigration enforcement policy. 

Senate Democrats have declined to approve a funding bill for the department following the deaths of two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis during a months-long immigrant enforcement operation. 

The Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs voted, 8-7, to move Mullin’s nomination forward Thursday. Mullin did not gain the support of the fellow Republican who chairs the committee, Rand Paul of Kentucky, but still received a favorable vote from the committee because Fetterman joined all other Republicans in voting in Mullin’s favor.

Paul did not vote on Sunday.

During Mullin’s confirmation hearing, Paul questioned whether Mullin could lead the DHS given his “anger issues.” He also confronted Mullin about his comments calling Paul a “freaking snake” and expressing sympathy for a neighbor who assaulted Paul in a 2017 attack that broke six of his ribs and damaged a lung.

Outgoing DHS Secretary Kristi Noem leaves the department, which has the primary responsibility of enforcing President Donald Trump’s aggressive immigration policy, with myriad problems, including a bottleneck in approving Federal Emergency Management Agency grants.

Noem, the former governor of South Dakota, also came under bipartisan criticism for describing the victims of the fatal Minneapolis shootings, Renee Good and Alex Pretti, as domestic terrorists without any evidence. 

Mullin made a similar comment the day of Pretti’s shooting, but said during his confirmation hearing that he regretted the statement, though he stopped short of apologizing to Pretti’s family.

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Thursday voted to move forward Oklahoma Sen. Markwayne Mullin’s nomination to lead the Department of Homeland Security. 

After the 8-7 vote, Mullin’s nomination will head to the Senate floor. 

Thursday’s vote comes a day after Mullin, a Republican, appeared before the committee in a contentious nomination hearing in which the GOP chair, Sen. Rand Paul, questioned whether Mullin should lead the department given his “anger issues.”

Paul, of Kentucky, voted against advancing Mullin’s nomination, the only Republican on the panel to oppose a fellow senator.

But because Democratic Sen. John Fetterman of Pennsylvania voted with the rest of the Republicans, Mullin’s nomination advanced.

In a statement, Fetterman said his vote to approve Mullin was “rooted in a strong, committed, constructive working relationship with Senator Mullin for our nation’s security.”

Paul at the Wednesday hearing took issue with Mullin referring to him as a “freaking snake” and expressing sympathy for a neighbor who assaulted Paul in 2017, breaking six ribs and injuring a lung.

Mullin told senators in the hearing that he aims to lead DHS differently than Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, the former South Dakota governor whom the president removed from the post earlier this month and reassigned to another position within the administration. 

Mullin said he would do away with several policies that Noem implemented, such as a requirement for disaster grants to be personally approved by the secretary of Homeland Security. 

He added that he wants DHS to “not be in the news every day,” referencing the aggressive enforcement tactics by immigration agents that have been caught on camera, including their involvement in the deaths of two Minneapolis residents. 

Mullin will likely leave his Senate seat after he votes for his own nomination to lead DHS. It’s similar to a move by Secretary of State Marco Rubio last year, when he left his U.S. Senate seat representing Florida after voting to confirm his nomination to lead the State Department. 

The top Democrat on the committee, Sen. Gary Peters of Michigan, said Thursday that DHS “needs a leader who can restore the trust that DHS has broken with the American people,” and that he did not have confidence that Mullin could tackle that challenge. 

Peters, like Paul, raised concerns about Mullin’s “temperament to lead this critical department.”

”There will be no shortage of political disagreements facing the new DHS secretary,” Peters said. “The department and the American people deserve a leader who is steady and proven under pressure, not just someone better than the very low bar set by his predecessor.”

WASHINGTON — U.S. Sen. Markwayne Mullin of Oklahoma, the president’s pick to lead the Department of Homeland Security, on Wednesday in his confirmation hearing was challenged with questions about his “anger issues” by the fellow Republican who heads the Senate committee that oversees the department.

Kentucky Republican Sen. Rand Paul, chair of the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, at the outset of the hearing recalled how Mullin called him a “freaking snake” and expressed sympathy for a neighbor who assaulted Paul in a 2017 dispute, breaking six of his ribs and damaging a lung.

“You have never had the courage to look me in the eye and tell me that the assault was justified,” Paul said to Mullin, nominated by President Donald Trump to replace Kristi Noem as secretary of the 260,000-employee agency. “Tell it to my face, if that’s what you believe.”

In a tense back-and-forth, Mullin defended himself and said he never “supported” that Paul was assaulted, but that he “understood” why the neighbor attacked Paul.

“I think everybody in this room knows that I’m very blunt,” Mullin, a former MMA fighter who physically challenged a witness testifying before Congress in 2023, said. 

Paul criticized him and “this machismo that you have” and raised concerns about how Mullin could lead a department and “why (the American public) should trust a man with anger issues to set the proper example for ICE and Border Patrol agents.” 

Noem was ousted from the job after a national uproar over the killing of two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis in January by immigration agents and public disapproval of aggressive enforcement tactics there and in Los Angeles and Chicago.

“I just wonder if someone who applauds violence against their political opponents is the right person to lead an agency that has struggled to accept limits to the proper use of force,” Paul said. 

Mullin did not apologize for his comments regarding Paul’s assault, and said that leading DHS is “bigger than the political differences we have.”

Mullin detailed his plans to senators, pledging to reverse several policies of his predecessor, including making sure “DHS isn’t on the news every day.” 

Mullin also promised to get DHS fully funded and continue to carry out the president’s mass deportation agenda. 

If confirmed, he will have access to a special funding stream of $175 billion for DHS included in 2025’s “one big, beautiful” tax and spending cut package, which Mullin backed as a senator. 

Post-Noem era

Trump shifted Noem, the former governor of South Dakota, into another administration position earlier this month. 

Her tenure drew bipartisan ire over her quick judgment to label the two U.S. citizens killed by immigration agents as domestic terrorists, her stalling of disaster relief grants for states, and the award of a $220 million no-bid contract for an ad campaign to a firm owned by a subordinate’s spouse. 

Paul said the committee plans to vote Thursday on whether to advance Mullin’s nomination to the Senate floor. Trump has said he wants Mullin on the job by the end of the month.

If the Senate confirms Mullin, he would be the first Native American to lead DHS. He is an enrolled member of the Cherokee Nation. 

Senate Majority Leader John Thune, Republican of South Dakota, told reporters Wednesday that he was confident Mullin could be confirmed as Homeland Security secretary. 

“Rand and Markwayne have some personal history which they’re going to have to work through,” Thune said. “But this is about the job, and it’s about who ought to fill that job. We all believe … that Markwayne is the right guy for the job.”

One Democrat already a yes

The junior senator from Oklahoma, who was elected to the Senate in a 2022 special election, does not need any Democratic support to be confirmed to lead the agency, since Republicans control the chamber with 53 seats.

And even without Paul’s support, one Democrat, Sen. John Fetterman of Pennsylvania, who sits on the committee, has already pledged his vote. 

Mullin, if confirmed, will take over a department shut down since early February, after Democrats refused to vote for fiscal year 2026 funding unless changes to immigration enforcement are made following the deaths of the two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis, Renee Good and Alex Pretti. 

The top Democrat on Homeland Security, Gary Peters, pressed Mullin about his previous comments about Good and Pretti. Mullin joined top Trump officials in accusing both of being agitators. 

Mullin admitted his mistake and said he was too quick to judge. 

“I shouldn’t have said that,” Mullin said. “I went out there too fast. I was responding immediately without the facts. That’s my fault. That won’t happen as (Homeland Security) secretary.”

Noem has never admitted she was wrong to label Good, a mother of three and poet, and Pretti, an intensive care unit nurse who specialized in care for veterans, as domestic terrorists. She was criticized by both Democrats and Republicans for her comments.

On Wednesday, Republicans on the panel largely praised Mullin, except for Paul, and criticized Democrats for not approving government funding for DHS.

House Democrats are trying to force a legislative procedure to bring a funding bill for DHS that does not include any appropriations for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection.

ICE questions

Michigan Democratic Sen. Elissa Slotkin pressed Mullin on reforms he would make to ICE. 

Sen. Richard Blumenthal, Democrat of Connecticut, asked Mullin about an arrest quota of 3,000 immigrants daily that White House senior advisor Stephen Miller, the main architect of the Trump administration’s immigration policy, has set for ICE officers.

“I can’t speak for Stephen Miller,” Mullin said. “No quota has been set for me.”

Blumenthal also pressed Mullin about concerns over violations of the 4th Amendment of the Constitution by federal immigration agents entering homes and businesses without a judicial warrant. 

He asked Mullin if he would “commit that ICE will no longer instruct agents to break into people’s homes without a judicial warrant?”

“Sir, you’re using the word ‘break into’ people’s houses loosely,” Mullin said. “We will not enter a home or place of business without a judicial warrant unless we’re pursuing an individual that runs into a business or resident.”

Blumenthal also addressed Noem’s award of the $220 million no-bid contract, which she was grilled about by unhappy Republicans in a congressional hearing shortly before Trump removed her as secretary of DHS.

Mullin said that he would let the inspector general, an independent agency within DHS, continue with an investigation. 

“I’ll leave that to the (Inspector General),” Mullin said.  

Detention warehouse purchases

Democrats pressed Mullin if he would keep certain policies in place made by Noem, whose last day is March 31, and questioned recent moves by DHS to purchase warehouses across the country for mass detention of immigrants in the country without legal status. 

New Jersey Sen. Andy Kim said a policy from Noem has led to a backlog in Federal Emergency Management Agency relief. Noem instituted a requirement that she had to personally sign off on any FEMA award totaling more than $100,000. 

Kim asked Mullin if he would consider getting rid of that policy.

“Absolutely,” Mullin said. “That is micromanaging.”

Kim also brought up a warehouse recently purchased by DHS in Roxbury, New Jersey, to detain up to 1,500 immigrants that has concerned local community leaders.

“Most municipalities don’t have the capacity and their infrastructure for waste and water” to handle a warehouse that is meant to detain people, Kim said. 

“This town has only 42 foot police officers, a volunteer fire department. Does that sound like the kind of town that has resources to take on a warehouse?” he asked Mullin.

Mullin did not say DHS would stop its warehouse initiative, but said he wanted to make sure that the local communities were on board, and pledged to personally visit that location with Kim to meet with leaders. 

New Hampshire’s Democratic Sen. Maggie Hassan also raised the issue of a warehouse location in her state. DHS initially planned to purchase a warehouse in Merrimack to retrofit the facility to detain immigrants, but backed off.

She asked Mullin if he would “ensure that the plan remains off the table?” 

Mullin said he wasn’t caught up on that specific facility, but that he would work to get the local community’s input.  

More FEMA questions

Fellow Oklahoma Republican Sen. James Lankford asked Mullin how he sees the future of FEMA. The president has expressed his desire to dismantle the agency, and a FEMA review council was formed to issue a report on its findings. 

Mullin said that FEMA should not be considered a first response agency, and that when natural disasters strike, it’s the state response that is first. 

“We can be more effective and be more direct and speed it up,” he said. 

Mullin added that he doesn’t believe FEMA should be dismantled, but that it could be restructured. 

Mullin’s overseas ventures

The top Republican and Democrat on the committee, Paul and Peters, grilled Mullin on his past comments on a 2016 international trip taken while he served in the House. During a Fox News interview, Mullin implied he had been on military missions and could “smell war.” Mullin has not served in the military.

Mullin declined to discuss those comments, arguing that the travel was while he was on official duty and classified. He described those trips as for training purposes.

Peters asked why the trip wasn’t included in his disclosure records to the committee, and Mullin argued that because it was considered official travel, he didn’t need to disclose it.

Paul said he would consider postponing the committee’s vote unless Mullin would agree to visit a secure facility where classified matters are discussed, known as a SCIF, to detail his international travel. 

Mullin said he would go to a SCIF with lawmakers ahead of the committee vote Thursday. 

Jennifer Shutt contributed to this report.

 

Leer in espanol. 

Andrea Pedro-Francisco was supposed to have surgery more than a month ago.

A cyst on her ovary has swelled to nearly the size of a tennis ball and is now at risk of rupturing or cutting off blood supply. The pain is so severe that her doctor prescribed her an opioid.

She’s only received Tylenol or ibuprofen for the pain since she was arrested on her way to work on Feb. 5 in Minnesota and shipped to a Texas detention center, where she’s waiting for a judge to decide whether her detention is even legal.

“I want to be able to go back to my family,” Pedro-Francisco, 23, said in Spanish in a video interview, wearing a navy blue sweatshirt and looking ashen. “I feel sad. I feel tired. I feel desperate to get out of here and see my family again.”

Her case has been taken up by a team of pro bono attorneys and even members of Congress, but to little avail.

Democratic U.S. Rep. Angie Craig, who represents the Twin Cities suburbs where Pedro-Francisco lives, sent inquiries to Homeland Security officials hoping to pressure them to provide adequate medical treatment.

Craig says she’s been stonewalled with demands for various forms and out-of-office messages citing the partial government shutdown. She said she considered flying to El Paso to conduct an oversight visit but the facility is currently in lockdown because of a measles outbreak.

“We are very worried she could have an infection right now … and the Trump administration won’t do a damn thing about it,” Craig said in an interview. “I don’t want Andrea to die.”

ICE did not respond to a request for comment.

Pedro-Francisco is one of 4,000 immigrants the Trump administration says it arrested during Operation Metro Surge — although it has not provided an accounting of all those arrests — with some 3,000 federal agents descending on Minnesota for what the Department of Homeland Security called its largest operation ever.

Many have been ordered released by federal judges who ruled their detentions unlawful. But many others remain languishing in federal facilities across the country even if, like Pedro-Francisco, they have no criminal record and have lived in the United States for years.

While the Trump administration repeatedly claimed to be targeting the “worst of the worst,” the vast majority of those arrested during Trump’s second term have no violent criminal charges or convictions, according to an internal Department of Homeland Security document obtained by CBS News.

Taken on the way to work

Pedro-Francisco left her native Guatemala for the United States with her mother to seek asylum in 2019 when she was 16 years old. They arrived in Minnesota with virtually nothing and debt from the journey.

They quickly built a new life. They found jobs cleaning houses, moved into a house in Burnsville, and joined a church. Pedro-Francisco sings in the choir and plays the bajo, a Mexican bass guitar.

“I came here with my family to do something, to achieve something with my own strength, with my own hands. And after that, they took me away,” Pedro-Francisco said.

Pedro-Francisco was driving to work with her mother and a neighbor one Thursday morning when they were stopped by two unmarked vehicles. One parked in front and the other behind. Half a dozen masked men surrounded them, demanding to see their documents, she said.

She said she doesn’t know why they stopped her. There was no warrant for her arrest.

It could be they ran the license plate and saw a Hispanic name. Or because the federal agents believed three Latina women in a car was reason enough to initiate a stop. A federal judge appointed by President Trump found that Homeland Security has racially profiled Latino and Somali residents and arrested them without probable cause, which while unconstitutional, nevertheless yielded results as the Trump administration pursues mass deportations.

The agents put handcuffs on Pedro-Francisco and her neighbor.

Her mother pleaded with an agent to let her go, telling him there was no one to care for her children. She has two younger children, a 5- and a 1-year old, both U.S. citizens.

“‘Who’s going to take care of my children?’ I asked him,” said Pedro-Francisco’s mother in an interview in Spanish, choking back tears. She was granted anonymity due to her fear of retribution from federal officials.

“Then he said, ‘Okay, we’re going to let you go, but only today … If another group catches you, they’ll take you away.’”

She gave her daughter one last hug, and the agents placed Pedro-Francisco, handcuffed, in the back of the unmarked car.

Within a couple hours she was on a flight to Texas.

‘They treat us like animals’ 

Pedro-Francisco was taken to Camp East Montana, a troubled tent prison on the site of a former World War II detention camp for Japanese Americans at Fort Bliss near El Paso.

It was hurriedly constructed last summer to meet the growing need for detention space after the Trump administration enacted a policy of mandatory detention for many undocumented immigrants, even those who have lived in the country for years with no criminal history.

The detention facility is now ICE’s largest: around 3,000 people packed into long tent structures. Pedro-Francisco says she is kept in a room with around 60 people except for about an hour a day, when they are chained together and taken outside.

“They chain us up as if we had committed a very serious crime,” Pedro-Francisco said. “They treat us like animals.”

The ceiling leaks when it rains. The food is inedible. Pedro-Francisco says she’s lost around 10 lbs.

The crowded conditions have also made it a hotbed of disease, with outbreaks of COVID-19, tuberculosis and the measles.

Three detainees died in the facility in a six-week period, including a man who was suffocated in a struggle with multiple guards. His death was ruled a homicide. Suicide attempts are so common that some guards take bets on which detainee will succeed next, according to a former detainee who spoke to the Associated Press.

With complaints of crowded quarters, medical neglect and poor nutrition mounting, ICE recently terminated the $1.3 billion contract with the company operating the facility, Acquisition Logistics. It had never run an ICE detention facility before — nor did it even have a functioning website.

When Pedro-Francisco arrived in early February, she wasn’t receiving any medication except the occasional Tylenol. The pain in her abdomen became so unbearable that within a couple days she was taken to a hospital, where she says a doctor confirmed the cyst yet declined to operate on her because she’s in immigration custody.

As the weeks have passed, she can feel herself getting sicker.

Instead of medical care, ICE has offered her another solution: self-deport. Every two or three days, she says, ICE officials enter their room to ask people to sign forms agreeing to voluntary removal.

Many have taken it, including a man from Minnesota whose lawyer said he only agreed because he was being denied medication for his diabetes.

“But my purpose, for me, here in the midst of suffering, pain and illness, my purpose is to be able to return to my family,” Pedro-Francisco said.

Caught in red tape and judicial delays

By swiftly transferring Pedro-Francisco to Texas, ICE has made it harder for her and other people arrested in Minnesota to challenge their detention through what’s called a habeas corpus petition. That seems to be by design.

Minnesota U.S. District Judge Donovan Frank wrote that he’s seen a “pattern of obfuscation” with ICE “attempting to hide the location of detainees, and thus, make habeas proceedings more difficult.”

Judges in Minnesota have been in revolt over the Trump administration’s policy of mandatory detention and repeated violations of their orders to release immigrants, even threatening the U.S. attorney with contempt.

While judges in Texas have also largely ruled against the Trump administration, the ultra-conservative 5th Circuit Court of Appeals recently ruled in its favor, making Texas, Louisiana and Mississippi more favorable venues for the administration to defend a policy that contradicts three decades of precedent.

Federal officials have said they simply ran out of space to hold people in Minnesota during an unprecedented surge in arrests.

Approximately 200 people detained in Minnesota have been transferred out-of-state and remain in detention centers across the country — in Texas, New Mexico, Louisiana, Nebraska and Mississippi — according to Sarah Brenes, executive director of the Binger Center at the University of Minnesota Law School and one of the directors of the Minnesota Habeas Project.

By the time Pedro-Francisco was connected with a lawyer, she was already in Texas. Her case was taken up by attorney Asra Syed, managing partner at the Austin law firm Botkin Chiarello Calaf. She was referred to Pedro-Francisco’s case through the informal network of volunteer lawyers that sprung up during Operation Metro Surge.

Syed filed a habeas corpus petition to challenge Pedro-Francisco’s detention on Feb. 13 and mentioned her urgent need for medical attention. While the federal government usually has three days to justify its detention of a person, U.S. Judge Leon Schydlower gave the government more than three weeks from when the petition was filed to respond.

“She doesn’t have a way to get the health care that she needs unless she’s out of detention. And how is she supposed to get out of detention unless the judge rules on the habeas petition quickly?” Syed said.

In the interim, Syed filed two more motions asking the court to speed up Pedro-Francisco’s case and order the federal government to administer her prescribed medications and have her examined by an independent hospital physician. They went unanswered.

Syed also reached out to her representative, Democratic U.S. Rep. Greg Casar, who connected her with Craig. Democratic U.S. Rep. Veronica Escobar, who represents the El Paso area that’s home to the detention center, also got involved.

Syed became hopeful, but she and the congresswomen were quickly moored in ICE’s kafkaesque bureaucracy.

In order to conduct oversight, the congresswomen needed Pedro-Francisco to fill out a form authorizing the visit and for Homeland Security to share information about her. But there is no way for Pedro-Francisco to fill out or mail the form in detention. There’s no commissary to buy envelopes and stamps, Syed said. Pedro-Francisco also can’t sign releases giving her attorneys access to her medical records.

An attorney planned to visit the detention center to get Pedro-Francisco’s signatures in person. Then came the measles outbreak, which has stopped anyone from visiting detainees in person, be they attorneys or members of Congress.

Craig said she reached out to a senior DHS official but received a bounceback citing the partial government shutdown. Congressional Democrats are refusing to support renewing funding for the agency without reforms to what they say are ICE’s unconstitutional tactics.

“It’s just stunning, but not surprising at all, that … even as a congressional office, we haven’t been able to get her the help that she needs and deserves,” Craig said.

Her office has received some information from DHS about Pedro-Francisco’s condition — that they’re giving her an antidepressant and birth control pills.

But that’s at odds with what Pedro-Francisco says she’s receiving. She said she went days without even Tylenol to dull the unbearable pain, and then about a week ago also started receiving a prescription, though she’s unsure what it’s called.

Pedro-Francisco said she was also recently examined by a man in the detention center who conducted an ultrasound. He told her she didn’t have anything and gave her two pills to go to the bathroom, but she doesn’t trust anybody in the facility. She’s requested the man’s name and records of her treatment in detention to show her lawyers but has not received either.

Inadequate medical care and poor record-keeping have been documented repeatedly at Camp East Montana, even by ICE’s own inspectors, who found 60 violations in 50 days.

Pedro-Francisco’s case remains at a standstill. The federal government filed an answer to her habeas corpus petition justifying her detention as an undocumented immigrant “seeking admission,” as if she were just apprehended at the border, and cited the recent 5th Circuit Court of Appeals ruling.

Now it’s up to a judge to decide, though when that will happen is unclear.

“I want to get out of here because I know that at home, where my family is, they can take care of me, and I can go to a doctor,” Pedro-Francisco said.

Madison McVan contributed translation. 

WASHINGTON — The U.S. Supreme Court Monday said it will hear oral arguments in April in two cases brought by immigrants hailing from Syria and Haiti after the Trump administration tried to end their temporary protections, initially granted because their countries had been deemed too dangerous for return. 

Monday’s order consolidates two cases, one brought on behalf of 6,000 Syrians with Temporary Protected Status and another from 350,000 Haitians. 

The justices also declined to grant the Trump administration’s request to stay a lower court order that prevented the end of TPS for those two countries, meaning that protections from deportation will remain for now for those immigrants. 

The justices will hear arguments for the cases in the last week of April, with final briefs due by April 20. A specific date has not yet been set.

Congress created TPS to allow immigrants from countries dealing with war, natural disasters, political violence or other instabilities to remain and work in the United States on a temporary basis, ranging from six months to 18 months. 

The TPS holders who sued the Trump administration have argued that their countries’ conditions were not considered when the Department of Homeland Security determined their protections should end. 

The Trump administration has sought to cancel legal protections for immigrants, so far revoking TPS status for 13 of the 17 countries that were designated at the start of President Donald Trump’s second term. 

Those 13 countries are Afghanistan, Cameroon, Ethiopia, Haiti, Honduras, Myanmar, Nepal, Nicaragua, Somalia, South Sudan, Syria, Venezuela and Yemen.  

The four remaining countries with TPS expiring this year without an extension are El Salvador, Lebanon, Sudan and Ukraine.

WASHINGTON — If Oklahoma GOP Sen. Markwayne Mullin is confirmed by the Senate to lead the Department of Homeland Security, he will take over an agency that has faced a weeks-long funding lapse, public blowback to its immigration enforcement strategy and a bottleneck of disaster relief awards left by his predecessor that drew bipartisan ire. 

Additionally, if the United States remains at war with Iran, he’d oversee monitoring for security threats. That is a task some lawmakers are skeptical the department can undertake during its shutdown. 

Mullin, who does not need any Democratic support to be confirmed to lead DHS, will have his nomination hearing March 18 before the Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs. The committee will vote to move his nomination to the Senate floor the following day, committee Chair Rand Paul of Kentucky told reporters.

The Oklahoman would take over from Kristi Noem, whom President Donald Trump ousted after a disastrous two days of testimony on Capitol Hill that capped a controversial 14-month tenure as DHS secretary.

“She was tasked to do a very difficult job … and I think she has performed the best she can do under the circumstances,” Mullin said of Noem, shortly after the president announced his intention to nominate him. “Is there always lessons that can be learned? Every day there’s something you can do better.”

But Mullin would face the same challenges, if not more, once he takes over. 

In addition to heading Trump’s aggressive immigration push, which is at a low point in popular support after the fatal shootings of two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis in January, Mullin would also be tasked with restoring faith in the department’s spending decisions and repairing the pipeline for sending relief to disaster-stricken areas. 

Noem faced bipartisan scrutiny during hearings this month for her record on those issues, including awarding a $220 million no-bid contract for an ad campaign to a firm owned by a subordinate’s spouse and requiring that she personally approve almost all Federal Emergency Management Agency expenditures.

Noem often clashed with critics, especially Democrats. Mullin indicated he’d try to find more common ground.

“Yes, I’m a Republican. Yes, I’m conservative. But (the) Department of Homeland Security is to keep everybody (safe), regardless if you support me or not,” he told reporters. “My focus is to keep the homeland secure.” 

His time in Congress has not given Mullin a strong background in the subject matter. He’s never sat on any committees dealing with DHS policy. He is a member of the Senate Appropriations Committee, which writes funding bills for the entire federal government, but is not a member of the subcommittee that oversees the DHS funding bill.

If the Senate confirms Mullin, he would be the first Native American to lead DHS. He is an enrolled member of the Cherokee Nation. 

Mullin’s office referred questions for this story to the White House. In an email to States Newsroom, the White House said the Trump administration has “no DHS related policy announcements to make at this time.”

DHS funding

Mullin is a staunch Trump defender and supporter and will be tasked with carrying out his campaign promise of mass deportations of immigrants. To do that, DHS is flush with more than $175 billion for immigration enforcement and detention, through Republicans’ “One, Big Beautiful” law that Mullin voted for. 

“I look forward to earning the support of my colleagues in the Senate and carrying out President Trump’s mission alongside the department’s many capable agencies and the thousands of patriots who keep us safe every day,” Mullin wrote in a social media post shortly after the president’s announcement.  

Polling has found many Americans have soured on the campaign platform that won Trump a second term in the White House as DHS has deployed officers to conduct aggressive immigration enforcement in the interior of the country. Majorities of Democrats and independents said the Minneapolis shootings were a sign of broader problems in immigration enforcement, though most Republicans remained supportive of the administration.

The approach has led to massive protests against U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, especially after the deaths of Renee Good and Alex Pretti, both 37-year-old residents of Minneapolis. Another U.S. citizen, Ruben Martinez, was also killed by immigration agents in Texas last year.

Since Good and Pretti’s deaths last month, Democrats have blocked an appropriations bill for the department without significant changes in enforcement tactics. 

Mullin has argued that the appropriations bill provides an accountability measure in funding body cameras for immigration agents. He has pushed back on any restrictions on officers, such as barring them from covering their faces.

“We’re not going to handcuff law enforcement for a useless political exercise,” he wrote in a social media post.

Mullin’s reaction to Pretti video resembled Noem’s

One of the biggest criticisms from Noem was that she referred to Pretti and Good as domestic terrorists. Multiple videos contradicted those claims, and Noem refused to admit she made a mistake or apologize to their families when she was questioned by lawmakers.

While Mullin didn’t use that label, he made a similar claim, implying that Pretti’s actions were a felony. Mullin stressed his support for law enforcement.

“Obstructing federal law enforcement is a felony. Most Americans follow ICE instructions without thinking twice,” Mullin wrote on social media hours after the shooting. “These patriots are doing a difficult job under an 8,000% rise in death threats.”

Mullin was not the only Senate Republican to take that position, but some did take a different view.

Paul joined the top Democrat on the committee that oversees DHS, Gary Peters of Michigan, in grilling the heads of two immigration enforcement agencies within the department about Pretti’s death.

“He is retreating at every moment,” Paul said of Pretti. “He’s trying to get away, and he’s being sprayed in the face. I don’t think that’s de-escalatory. That’s an escalatory thing.”

Senators will get a chance to question where Mullin will lead the agency and whether he will continue some of Noem’s hardline immigration policies, such as the revocation of legal status for millions of immigrants who hail from countries initially granted protections because their home country is deemed too dangerous to return to. 

Mullin has often criticized local governments that have policies to not cooperate with or assist the federal government in immigration enforcement. 

In an interview with States Newsroom, Peters said he had not spoken with Mullin about leading DHS and looked forward to questioning him before the committee.

In addition to immigration-related agencies and FEMA, the department includes the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, the Secret Service and the Coast Guard. 

Additionally, the department will manage security for major events: the World Cup and the celebration for the 250th anniversary of the country’s founding that will occur blocks from the White House. 

FEMA bottleneck

Another Noem policy that drew bipartisan criticism was her requirement she give personal approval of any FEMA contracts or grants worth more than $100,000.

It effectively created a bottleneck of relief to disaster-stricken places, and lawmakers expressed their frustration to Noem that the policy meant delayed payments.

North Carolina GOP Sen. Thom Tillis berated Noem for his full 10 minutes of questioning when she appeared before the Senate Judiciary Committee about how her policy has slowed down recovery efforts in North Carolina, which was hit by the devastating Hurricane Helene in 2024. 

It’s unclear if Mullin will keep that policy in place.

“The Department of Homeland Security has a very broad jurisdiction and I think there’s a lot of work that we need to do,” Mullin told reporters. 

FEMA’s disaster relief fund is somewhat unique among federal programs since Congress has granted it the authority to deficit spend; it cannot run out of money, even during a shutdown. 

Trump has sought to downsize FEMA, firing part of its workforce and directing his officials to restructure the agency. There is currently no permanent FEMA administrator.

No DHS assignments in Congress

Mullin spent a decade in the House before being elected to the Senate in a special election in 2022.

In his time in the House from 2013 to 2023, Mullin sat on the Energy and Commerce, Transportation and Infrastructure and Natural Resources committees.

In the Senate, besides Appropriations, he sits on the Armed Services, Indian Affairs and Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions committees.

He chairs an appropriations subcommittee that handles funding for the legislative branch, and on the HELP Committee, he chairs the panel on Employment and Workplace Safety.  

Mullin, whose congressional staff totals nearly 40, based on records from the Legistorm data service, would oversee an agency with more than 272,000 employees and an annual budget of approximately $64 billion. 

Former pro fighter’s Senate confrontations

During a 2023 HELP Committee hearing, Mullin challenged International Brotherhood of Teamsters President Sean O’Brien to a physical fight, after heated testimony. 

“You know where to find me,” Mullin, who is a former professional MMA fighter, said to O’Brien.

Mullin will also have to appear before Paul, who he’s referred to as a “freaking snake,” for his confirmation hearing. Mullin also expressed sympathy for a neighbor of Paul’s, who was charged with assaulting the senator on his front lawn, breaking several ribs.

When pressed by reporters, Paul did not address Mullin’s comments.

“We’ll see how the hearing goes,” he said. 

Passengers at a handful of airports this week waited in hours-long security lines as the government shutdown of the Department of Homeland Security dragged on.

Though Transportation Security Administration officers are required by law to work during a lapse in funding, more than usual have been absent after receiving only a partial paycheck during the most recent pay period. TSA officers will miss an entire paycheck this weekend if the shutdown is still in effect then. 

No end to the shutdown appeared imminent Wednesday, as the U.S. Senate rejected a bill that would have funded TSA and other agencies in DHS that are not related to immigration enforcement.

In the meantime, TSA officers are not being paid. 

Most live paycheck-to-paycheck, said Johnny Jones, the secretary-treasurer of the American Federation of Government Employees Council 100, which represents TSA agents.

The lack of pay has contributed to absenteeism, Jones added. The union does not condone coordinated “sick-outs,” which are illegal. 

But individual officers miss work for one of three reasons during a shutdown, he said: pre-planned time off, legitimate illness or personal emergencies, and those calling in sick but seeking other work to pay bills.

“If you’re normally receiving a paycheck, you wouldn’t have that third group,” he said.

Some of those who are working are going without lunch or making other sacrifices, Jones added. And he said two colleagues were evicted during the most recent shutdown last fall, which lasted for 43 days.

The U.S. war against Iran, which has an estimated price in the billions of dollars in just its first two weeks, has also driven resentment among TSA workers, Jones said.

“One of the things that I’ve heard from the colleagues is that, man, we got plenty of money to go fight wars and bomb Iran, but we can’t pay our own employees,” he said.

Long lines

No exceptionally long wait times were reported Wednesday, but the previous few days saw several examples of snarled security lines.

Security lines topped three hours at Houston’s William P. Hobby International Airport on Monday and Tuesday. 

Lines at Louis Armstrong New Orleans International Airport were up to two hours Monday and the airport’s social media drew a direct line to the shutdown.

“Due to impacts from the federal government’s partial shutdown, there continues to be a shortage of TSA workers at the security checkpoint … which is causing longer-than-average lines,” the airport’s X account posted.

Atlanta’s Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport also urged passengers to leave extra time to account for factors including “TSA staffing constraints.”

CBS News reported Wednesday that more than 300 TSA agents have left their jobs since the shutdown began. TSA officials did not respond to messages seeking confirmation of that figure.

Senate gridlock

The top Democrat on the U.S. Senate Appropriations Committee, Washington’s Patty Murray, sought unanimous consent Wednesday for the Senate to approve a bill that would fund all of DHS other than Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Customs and Border Protection, and the secretary’s office.

Sen. Katie Britt, an Alabama Republican who chairs the subcommittee on Homeland Security funding, objected.

Murray’s bill “would effectively defund our law enforcement officers that are charged with keeping Americans safe,” Britt said.

Each party blamed the other for the impasse, which has been unbreachable since the department’s funding lapsed Feb. 14.

Following the January fatal shootings of two U.S. citizens by immigration officers in Minneapolis, Democrats are demanding changes to immigration agencies’ conduct as a condition of funding the department.

Republicans have said they are willing to negotiate the issue, but the parties disagree on what to do for the department, which also includes the Coast Guard and the Federal Emergency Management Agency, in the meantime.

Republican leaders sought to pass a short-term continuing resolution to fund the entire department, but Democrats rejected it, saying it would allow the operation of immigration agencies without adding accountability measures.

“Right now, TSA agents are going without pay because Republicans and the White House have decided they would rather shut down all of DHS than pass some very basic reforms to rein in ICE and Border Patrol,” Murray said. “We also want TSA and FEMA funded, but we are not going to be blackmailed into cutting a blank check for ICE to get it done.”

Politics cited

Senate Majority Leader John Thune, of South Dakota, said Democrats have stopped negotiating on DHS funding in a bid to keep the issue alive for the November midterm elections. 

“The American people are tired,” he said. “Lines get longer at the airports because TSA isn’t funded. The American people want us to do our jobs. Republicans are at the table. We’re ready to work toward a solution. Democrats have walked away.”

Jones, the AFGE member and TSA officer, declined to say which approach to short-term funding was preferable, but said it was Congress’ job to fund the federal government.

“We all swear the same oath to the same Constitution,” he said. “Now my job function is a little different than theirs, so they need to do theirs so I can do mine.”