What’s in Congress’s New ICE Funding Law?

Families across the country are struggling to afford health care, food, and housing. Instead of easing their burden, Congress has passed and President Trump has signed yet another law approving tens of billions of dollars for mass deportation. For the second time in less than a year, policymakers have prioritized immigration enforcement over supporting families, committing the equivalent of eight years’ worth of funding, or nearly a quarter of a trillion dollars, all at once to its cause without meaningful reforms or accountability measures attached.

This is following the murders of two American citizens at the hands of Immigration and Customs Enforcement earlier this year, and just days after Mamuka Artmeladze died in ICE’s custody: he’s the 19th person to die in ICE custody this year amid spikes in suicides at detention centers. Meanwhile, people across the country in detention centers like Delaney Hall are bravely holding hunger strikes to draw attention to the deplorable conditions and due process violations they face.

So, what’s in ICE’s new slush funds and what do they mean for our country?

S.2 is the ICE First, Families Last Act

The S.2 reconciliation bill provides nearly $70 billion in new funding for mass deportation and detention, which primarily benefits ICE and Customs and Border Protection. We are calling it the ICE First, Families Last Act because this legislation adds more money to violent agencies that are hurting families while doing nothing to address their real problems.

The bill provides:

• $38 billion to ICE to expand arrests, detention, deportation operations, and partnerships with state and local police.
• $26 billion to CBP to hire agents, expand surveillance, and increase enforcement at and between ports of entry.
• $5 billion to the Department of Homeland Security to support deportation and detention work related to this bill or in collaboration with local authorities under last year’s reconciliation bill.

This funding is not limited to maintaining historical levels of immigration enforcement. It is designed to scale up enforcement nationwide, locking in funding for mass deportation policies through the end of the current administration.

By using the budget reconciliation process, Congress bypassed the normal annual appropriations process, where Congress approves bipartisan annual bills to fund federal agencies. The appropriation bills that have funded DHS in recent years include basic guardrails like required oversight for detention, transparency measures requiring ICE to provide basic detention data to the public, and some basic civil rights protections in immigration enforcement.

This law includes none of those. By leaving out these protections, we may see DHS attempt to degrade the basic rights of people in its custody even further.

Enforcement as Political Retaliation is a Dangerous New Provision

Only hours before the Senate’s first vote on the ICE First, Families Last Act, Senate Republicans added a last-minute provision: Section 202(9), which gives $350 million for ICE to carry out enforcement actions in cities or states DHS decides are “non-cooperating” with the Trump mass deportation agenda.

This provision targets cities and states that:

• Do not have 287(g) agreements with ICE.
• Do not meet vague and evolving federal “compliance” standards set by DHS.

With this provision, Congress appears to be putting its stamp of approval on the use of immigration enforcement as a tool of political retaliation, directing ICE arrests, detention, and deportations toward communities based on their local policies. This is a direct attack on our democracy, with Congress’s approval.

Section 202(9) also creates a broad new category of people ICE can target using these funds, including:

• Any person ever charged with the federal offense of unauthorized entry, even if charges were dropped.
• People subject to an ICE hold after being arrested for nearly any offense, regardless of how minor.

This measure gives ICE another slush fund to subject community members to prolonged or unnecessary detention, including longtime residents, asylum seekers, and even U.S. citizens who are wrongly identified as noncitizens.

Congress Is Already Planning to Fund More ICE Operations

Although the ICE First, Families Last Act has only just become law, Congress is already working on DHS funding for fiscal year 2027, which begins October 1. House Republican Appropriations Committee members have proposed tens of billions more for ICE and CBP through the regular appropriations process to the tune of nearly $30 billion.

This makes clear that the $70 billion in S.2 is not a one-time proposal: it is part of a continuous effort to expand immigration enforcement spending year after year. There is no endpoint, no clear strategy, and no accountability for how this money is being used beyond political retaliation, detention of vulnerable families, and destruction of communities.

Congress Must Change Course

Our position has not changed. A single dollar more for ICE, which now has more money than most militaries around the world, is unacceptable.

Congress must:

• Repeal and claw back the $240 billion in mass deportation funding, including both S.2 and last year’s reconciliation law.
• Redirect those resources to meet the real needs of people across the country, including lowering the cost of health care, expanding access to food and nutrition support, and investing in affordable housing.

The choice could not be clearer. Congress can continue to fund a system that causes harm and fails to deliver for working families — or it can invest in policies that help people meet their basic needs and build stable, healthy communities.