By Jesse Franzblau
On Thursday, U.S. Senators rejected a federal funding package that included a Department of Homeland Security (DHS) funding bill that would have provided billions of new tax dollars to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Patrol (CBP).
The mass mobilization of communities across the country rising up and speaking out against ICE’s and CBP’s violence has forced Congress to finally exercise its authority and consider measures to rein in the agencies’ abuses. The message is loud and clear: Congress must appropriate tax dollars into health care and vital public services and stop lining the pockets of CEOs who profit from DHS private prison and surveillance contractors. For too long, Congress has shelled out funds that embolden ICE and CBP to act with impunity as they rip away parents and children without due process, shoot and kill neighbors in cold blood, and disappear people into an increasingly deadly detention system. Now is the time to for Congress to hear the demands to stop the Trump administration from deploying these agencies to advance a racist and repressive. Congress must use this moment to deny any more funds for ICE and CBP, demand a complete withdrawal of these surge forces from U.S. communities, starting with Minnesota, and enact meaningful policy changes to stop the violence being unleashed on our communities.
The mass mobilization of communities across the country rising up and speaking out against ICE’s and CBP’s violence has forced Congress to finally exercise its authority and consider measures to rein in the agencies’ abuses.
How did we get here?
ICE and CBP’s budget has steadily increased over the last two decades. Congress increased ICE’s annual budget from $3.4 billion in 2004 to $9.2 billion in 2024. CBP’s budget increased from $4.9 to $20 billion over the same two decades. In March 2025, Congress passed a year-long continuing resolution bolstering ICE funding to $10 billion. Then in July 2025, Congress gave these agencies historic additional funding through the reconciliation process (One Big Beautiful Bill Act, OBBBA), providing $75 billion for ICE alone, and $64 billion for CBP. The administration has used this windfall of money, available through 2029, to supercharge ICE and CBP’s Border Patrol operations that are now terrorizing our cities, and to incarcerate more people than ever before in the expanding deadly immigration detention system.
Where can we go from here?
The only way to rein in the violence we are witnessing daily by ICE and Border Patrol forces is to stop the funding for these agencies. Congress must wake up to the reality that communities have been facing on the ground for years – the only way to stop the cycle of violence and impunity is to stop rewarding these agencies with more funds. Our public funds should go toward community needs, not prisons, surge forces and deportations. The immigration system has become a cash cow that benefits private prison CEOs, big tech companies, and other contractors that use inside lobbyists to advance their corporate interests. Congress now must listen to the people, say no more funds for these repressive agencies, and reinvest these funds in health, education, and services that improve the wellbeing of our communities. Our elected leaders can use this moment to enact meaningful policy changes that stop ICE and Border Patrol abuses for good.
Jesse Franzblau is NIJC’s associate director of policy.