Here's some news from POLITICO's congressional reporter. Democrats not only want to defund DHS, but some also want to require judicial warrants for immigration arrests, among other demands.
Democrats are coalescing around a number of DHS bill changes:
— Meredith Lee Hill (@meredithllee) January 27, 2026
-require judicial warrants for immigration arrests, overruling a recently disclosed ICE memo asserting they are not required
-mandate federal agents identify themselves
-require DHS to cooperate with state and local…
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… investigations
-limit the “mission creep of federal agencies.”
Others also want:
-End roving patrols and profiling
-Require agents use body cameras
-End arrest quotas
Those aren't all bad. Imagine if the ICE agent who Renee Good tried to run down were wearing a body camera instead of holding a phone. That would be one more angle to consider.
Jordain Carney and Meredith Lee Hill report for POLITICO:
As recently as Friday, enough senators were expected to help pass the full set of funding bills, which was negotiated over the course of months by bipartisan appropriators. Now, according to a person granted anonymity to disclose private discussions, Democrats are quickly “coalescing” around a number of changes they want to the DHS bill, which won only seven Democratic votes in the House.
Those include requiring judicial warrants for immigration arrests, overruling a recently disclosed ICE memo asserting they are not required. Other potential Democratic amendments would mandate federal agents identify themselves, require DHS to cooperate with state and local investigations and limit the “mission creep of federal agencies.”
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Fox News' Bill Melugin, though, has a particular problem with the requirement for judicial warrants:
If reports are true that Dems are demanding judicial warrants for all ICE arrests as part of DHS funding bill, that will take a massive amount of targets off the board for ICE. They would only be able to go after illegal immigrants who have committed a new *federal* crime *after*…
— Bill Melugin (@BillMelugin_) January 28, 2026
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… entering the U.S. illegally.
State & local crimes would not apply. (Feds don’t enforce state & local).
For instance, if an illegal immigrant gets arrested in Minnesota for a DUI crash causing great bodily injury (state crime) and bonds out of jail, ICE would not be able to target him for arrest because there would be no judicial warrant (not a federal crime).
ICE would not be able to target anyone for just being in the U.S. illegally. They would have to wait for a federal crime to be committed, then a federal judge would have to sign off on probable cause for arrest.
It would cripple any hopes of “mass deportations” or widespread immigration enforcement.
Warrants are *not* required for ICE arrests under US law right now. They simply need probable cause that the target is detainable/deportable on immigration grounds and use I-200 and I-205 civil administrative warrants.
The most common judicial warrants ICE uses to target aliens right now is for illegal re-entry (8 USC 1326), a federal felony when a deported alien has re-entered the U.S. after deportation. But again, that is a limited population as most non-citizens haven’t been deported before.
ICE *does* need a judicial warrant to enter homes. Their administrative warrants do not allow them to enter private property. That’s why we often see them waiting for a target to go to or from work when they’re in public.
One ICE contact in a sanctuary city tells me: “If we need a judicial warrant for every arrest, we would maybe have 15 arrests in a year.” (In his city).
It's bad enough that we have to see AWFLs recording ICE agents with their phones and demanding to see warrants.
Do a thread of the criminals that would get to stay.
— Stacey (@ScotsFyre) January 28, 2026
If your policy requires waiting for someone to hurt people again before acting, you don’t truly care about safety. You’re more concerned about political points.
— The Undercurrent (@NotTheirScript) January 28, 2026
No thanks! Arrest them all, deport them all.
— Gunther Eagleman™ (@GuntherEagleman) January 28, 2026
Democrats can demand all they want. Republicans are in power.
— Gays For Trump (@GaysForTrump) January 28, 2026
Any Republican who would go along with this should be primaried.
— Clint Buckingham (@clintbuckingham) January 28, 2026
Not happening
— NH Gal (@realNHGal) January 28, 2026
Judges would block the warrants also so it would be the nail in the coffin for deportations
— Me Myself I (@iryoung_ink) January 28, 2026
People need to get a spine. Democrats can demand all they want. Their purpose is not about rights. It's about obstructing the will of the people.
— Debra Kipp (@dkipp1353) January 28, 2026
These are nonstarters. They can pound rocks. The compromise position is that all the illegals get to go home.
— How I Mine for Fish? (@HowIMineFish) January 28, 2026
This demand cannot happen or we truly will no longer have a country of law and order. We are close to that scenario now.
— Sherry Renaud 🇺🇸🇨🇦 (@sherryhanna53) January 28, 2026
Someone called this "Temu amnesty," which is what Sen. Chuck Schumer has been asking for. There's no way Republican senators can let him have it.
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