Transportation Security Administration employees have been working without pay for more than a month. File Photo by Bonnie Cash/UPI | License Photo
President Donald Trump threatened to send U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement agents to airports to cover for the Transportation Security Administration unless Democrats agree to Republican funding plans for the Department of Homeland Security.
On Truth Social, the president posted: “If the Democrats do not allow for Just and Proper Security at our Airports, and elsewhere throughout our Country, ICE will do the job far better than ever done before! The Fascist Democrats will never protect America, but the Republicans will.”
In an earlier post, he said ICE agents at airports “will do Security like no one has ever seen before, including the immediate arrest of all Illegal Immigrants who have come into our Country, with heavy emphasis on those from Somalia, who have totally destroyed, with the approval of a corrupt Governor, Attorney General, and Congresswoman, Ilhan Omar, the once Great State of Minnesota.”
Former acting ICE Director John Sandweg told The Washington Post that the threat is being used as a punishment.
“This is again an example, it seems to me, of the president seeking to utilize ICE in a way that achieves political goals, almost as a punishment,” Sandweg said. “The operations, to me, don’t seem to be designed to focus on public safety.”
The DHS, which includes TSA, shut down on Feb. 14 because Congress couldn’t agree on a funding bill for the department. Democrats don’t want to fund it until guardrails are put on the agency, and Republicans haven’t agreed to Democrats’ demands.
Because of this, TSA workers have been working without pay for more than a month. Some are quitting or taking days off work, creating long lines at airports.
Earlier on Saturday, billionaire Elon Musk offered to pay the TSA salaries during the shutdown.
“I would like to offer to pay the salaries of TSA personnel during this funding impasse that is negatively affecting the lives of so many Americans at airports throughout the country,” Musk said on X. Axios reported that based on TSA’s headcount, it would cost him more than $40 million per week. The White House didn’t respond to Musk’s offer.
Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., on Saturday told Republicans to support a Democratic bill to fund TSA. He said airport delays have reached a “boiling point.”
“If you want TSA workers to get paid, then vote yes,” Schumer said on the Senate floor.
Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., said in a statement that Trump should focus on his own party.
“Surely, the next thing people want after waiting hours in long TSA lines is to get wrongfully detained by ICE,” she said. “Here’s an idea: instead of sidelining TSA agents and sending ICE to harass travelers, the president should tell Republicans to stop blocking our bill to pay TSA.”
