Budget Reconciliation and Immigration Policy: Potential Areas of Impact for 2025

The 119th U.S. Congress, spanning 2025-2026, is expected to be fully controlled by the Republican party, which holds narrow majorities in the House of Representatives and Senate. With the White House also in Republican hands, congressional leaders will likely use a process called Budget Reconciliation to pass significant policy changes, bypassing the typical 60-vote supermajority needed for legislation to pass the Senate. Republican leadership has stated they plan to move two major bills on reconciliation, including in the first iteration funding billions of dollars for increased immigration detention and enforcement, border wall construction, and increased militarization of the border. The second bill will likely focus around tax cuts potentially offset by cutting public assistance programs, with anticipated funding and policy measures that will cause grave economic injustices for immigrants.

This analysis provides an overview of the reconciliation process from the lens of policies that impact immigrants, highlighting the potential and limits of this legislative tool to carry out anti-immigrant proposals.

The Possibilities and Limits of Reconciliation

Established by the Budget Act of 1974, reconciliation was initially intended to ensure that federal spending and revenue aligned with annual budget policies. Recently, with policymakers rarely agreeing on important issues, it has become a tool for the congressional majority to bypass the Senate filibuster to pass their agendas. For example, it was used to pass the American Rescue Plan and Inflation Reduction Act under President Biden, the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act under President Trump, and a portion of the Affordable Care Act under President Obama.

In order for a policy to be included in reconciliation, in general, it must:

• Primarily change federal spending or revenue.

It must not:

• Change policy beyond spending or revenue, including policy that has a “merely incidental” impact on fiscal policy. This is known as the “Byrd Rule.”
• Include policies that are projected to increase federal deficits beyond ten years after its passage.

These restrictions are primarily relevant in the Senate, where they can only be overridden by a 60-vote majority. The rules governing the reconciliation process are not self enforcing. In order for a provision or amendment to be challenged, a Senator must raise a point of order arguing that the provision violates one of the above restrictions. The Senate parliamentarian, a position subject to appointment and firing by the Senate majority leader, rules on whether particular provisions are permissible. If the parliamentarian finds a provision or amendment to be impermissible, a 60-vote majority will still permit the provision to move forward.

The Reconciliation Timeline

Reconciliation legislation must follow a particular path in Congress, creating different points at which policymakers can hear from the public. 

• Reconciliation starts with passage of a budget resolution. Typically passed once a fiscal year, budget resolutions are not law. Rather, they are passed by the House and Senate to set annual spending targets. A budget resolution can start the reconciliation process by including instructions to congressional committees. These instructions require committees to achieve certain numerical fiscal targets around spending, revenues, or deficits. If a committee is included, the final reconciliation package must include policies under its jurisdiction, while an excluded committee cannot have policies under its jurisdiction included. For example, if a budget resolution provides instructions to the Senate Committee on Homeland Security & Governmental Affairs, the reconciliation legislation could change spending on border policies. If the budget resolution does not include the Senate Finance Committee, the resulting legislation cannot address Medicaid. 
• In the Senate, budget resolutions and reconciliation legislation are both subject to unlimited amendments on the floor, a process known as “vote-a-rama.” Amendments must be compliant with reconciliation requirements to be subject to a 50-vote threshold, otherwise 60 senators must support it for inclusion. The vote-a-rama in the Senate will last until Senate leadership reaches an agreement to end debate on amendments; this often stretches into 12- or 24-hour marathons. For the budget resolution, amendments must be limited to the substance of the resolution itself and do not address policy, typically creating symbolic “reserve funds” addressing different topics.
• The impacted congressional committees develop and have a public markup of legislation that aligns with the spending or revenue target set out for it by the budget resolution. If the resolution calls for a committee to increase spending by a certain amount, the committee can go up to but not beyond that number. Amendments can be adopted in committee consideration.
• The Budget Committees compile the legislative language into one bill to be considered by their respective chambers. These committee markups are not required and could be bypassed.
• The full House and Senate vote on the reconciliation legislation. The Senate’s consideration will include vote-a-rama on the substance of the package, with 50-vote threshold amendments limited to the committees that received jurisdiction under the budget resolution and the other reconciliation requirements.
• The House and Senate can pass different reconciliation packages and work out the differences in a conference committee before repeating the process on a unified bill. Alternatively, one chamber could pass reconciliation legislation and the second could follow its lead. After passage, the bill is signed by the President and becomes law.

Historical Inclusion of Policies Impacting Immigrants Considered Under Reconciliation

Congresses under both Democratic and Republican control have considered policies impacting immigrants through reconciliation, providing insight into what may be allowed or restricted under Senate precedent.

In December 2021, Senate Democrats proposed creating pathways to lawful permanent residence (LPR) status for certain immigrants, including “Dreamers” and essential workers, in their Build Back Better reconciliation package by amending the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA). However, the Senate parliamentarian ruled that, despite the significant fiscal impact these changes would result in, their impact was ancillary to the primary goal of changing immigration policy and would not be allowed under reconciliation. The Parliamentarian also rejected a followup attempt to adjust the registry date in the INA that allows immigrants to adjust to LPR status and a subsequent proposal to expand access to parole, claiming that the same logic applied.

On the final parole option, which did not provide a direct pathway to LPR status, the parliamentarian justified her rejection by stating, “the grant of parole will be accompanied by mandatory issuances of work authorization, travel documents, a deeming of qualification for REAL ID and automatic renewal of [parole in place]. These are substantial policy changes with lasting effects just like those we previously considered and outweigh the budgetary impact.” In  her ruling on the initial plan, the parliamentarian noted that policies rescinding someone’s immigration status would similarly be unlikely to be acceptable. While immigration advocates urged Senate Democratic leadership to disregard the parliamentarian’s rulings, they chose not to do so.

In another occasion, when a senator proposed a vote-a-rama amendment to the Inflation Reduction Act, providing funding for the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to continue the Title 42 policy restricting access to asylum, the parliamentarian ruled it complied with reconciliation rules because it provided a change in funding and because of the temporary nature of the program. Conversely, a companion amendment proposed by Democrats to continue Title 42 and require a plan to address its end did not meet the reconciliation requirements, resulting in a 60-vote threshold. In that debate, the Senate also voted on amendments to build a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border, prohibit hiring Internal Revenue Service agents until 18,000 Border Patrol agents were hired, fund the detention and removal of undocumented immigrants who have committed felony offenses, and shift money to fund technology at the border; all failed to pass on a 50-vote threshold, without points of order on their reconciliation viability.

During the debate over the 2021 American Rescue Plan reconciliation package, amendments to prohibit stimulus funds for undocumented immigrants, prohibit stimulus funds for states and localities that limit cooperation with federal immigration enforcement, shift funds for the care and custody of unaccompanied immigrant children, and shift funds for Customs and Border Protection (CBP) drug screenings were also allowed at a 50-vote threshold, and all failed to pass.

In 1996, Congress also passed the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act, which created restrictions on immigrants’ eligibility for public assistance programs. However, given its immigrant provisions were never subjected to a challenge and received far more than the required 60 votes to bypass reconciliation’s Senate constrictions, it is unclear whether these policies would pass muster today.

Potential Areas of Immigrant Policies Likely to Come Up In Reconciliation in 2025

Republican leaders have already indicated they plan to include policies impacting immigrants in budget reconciliation. While typically decisions around spending on immigration enforcement agencies like Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) are made during the annual appropriations bills, reconciliation can be used to provide additional funds for these agencies. Republican Senator Lindsey Graham has suggested leadership will utilize reconciliation to seek additional funding for immigration detention, immigration agents, border wall construction, and surveillance technology along the border.

In addition to spending on border and enforcement policy, we expect policies impacting immigrants to come up in other policy areas. Many provisions of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act are set to expire in 2026, including restrictions on Child Tax Credit eligibility for children without a social security number. Republicans are expected to use reconciliation for consideration of these tax policies and may end, continue, or expand this exclusion. They may also consider changes to Medicaid, food assistance, housing, and other social service programs that could directly or indirectly harm immigrants.

Republicans could also attempt to make more sweeping changes to immigration policies beyond direct spending and revenue, such as restricting asylum or pathways to green cards. Given reconciliation’s restrictions on non-fiscal policies and long term deficits, their ability to do so will depend on the parliamentarian’s rulings, Republicans’ willingness to overrule her, or Democrats’ willingness to support these changes.

How Advocates Can Engage In the Reconciliation Process

Congress faces many decision points throughout the budget reconciliation process. From which committees receive instructions, to how much money they are directed to spend or save, to the policies included by committees, to the amendments adopted or rejected on the House and Senate floor, members of Congress will be making choices throughout and can be held accountable for them.

At every stage, advocates can share the stories, data, and impact of how vital immigrants are to every state and congressional district. In early January, advocates can urge Congress to not include any reconciliation instructions to committees with jurisdiction over border and immigration policy. When committees mark up bills, members of Congress on those committees should hear from their constituents in support of pro-immigrant amendments and in opposition to inclusion of anti-immigrant policies. And when the Senate goes through the rapid-fire vote-a-rama, advocates can be on standby to urge members to support immigrants.

Additional Resources

For more detail on the reconciliation process, please see these explainers:

• How Does Budget Reconciliation Work? – Center for American Progress 
• Introduction to Budget “Reconciliation” – Center on Budget and Policy Priorities
• The Budget Reconciliation Process: Timing of Legislative Action – Congressional Research Service
• The Senate Budget Process – Senate Budget Committee