Even when it is not dominating the headlines, ICE is still carrying out Trump’s dangerous and barbaric immigration enforcement agenda.
Families are still being torn apart. Communities are still being terrorized. People are still being swept into a detention system marked by abuse, neglect, and alarming reports of preventable deaths. And the Trump administration is still pushing to expand the machinery behind it all.
Now Republicans in Congress are trying to give that machinery a massive new infusion of federal funding, with nothing meaningful to rein in the agency’s abuses or improve accountability.
Republicans are expected to move as soon as Thursday on a reconciliation funding bill that would pour tens of billions of dollars into ICE and Customs and Border Protection for the remainder of Trump’s term. This is not a routine funding bill. It is a three-year blank check for Trump’s inhumane immigration crackdown.
Republicans have largely backed off the proposed funding for Trump’s White House ballroom project after public backlash. But they have already shown us how far they are willing to go. If they think they can slip funding for Trump’s vanity projects back into this bill without consequence – they will. We need affirmative language to ban any future effort to fund the slush fund.
That is why we must keep the pressure on now.
At a time when families are struggling with rising costs, health care remains under threat, and communities are demanding real investment and support, Republicans are trying to force through billions for Trump’s immigration enforcement agenda while keeping the door open to his vanity projects and potentially the slush fund.
This fund has already raised serious bipartisan alarms because it could be used to compensate people in Trump’s political orbit who claim they were targeted by the government under President Biden. That could include January 6 insurrectionists who stormed the Capitol, Trump allies, and others who may personally benefit from a payout scheme with almost no real transparency or accountability.
A federal judge has temporarily blocked the fund from moving forward, and the White House has reportedly backed down from pursuing it for now. But that does not erase the threat. Congress must act to make sure taxpayer dollars cannot be diverted into Trump’s slush fund through this bill or any other federal funding stream.
Our message to Congress is simple: reject this bill. And if Republicans force it through anyway, not one federal dollar should be available for Trump’s DOJ slush fund.
This fight is urgent. If Republicans move this week, we do not have time to wait and see what happens.
People For is working to expose what Republicans are trying to push through, mobilize supporters, and make sure Congress hears from the people who refuse to let Trump’s agenda go unanswered.
But we need a surge of public pressure now.
