Report: White House Reviews Offer To Reopen Homeland Security

White House negotiators are reviewing a Democratic proposal to fund and reopen the Department of Homeland Security, as talks continue to move slowly. However, Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-S.D.) said Tuesday that Democrats are not demonstrating urgency in reaching a deal.

According to Republicans familiar with the negotiations, the White House submitted its most recent offer to Senate Democrats more than two weeks ago. Democrats did not provide a counteroffer until late Monday evening.

A White House official confirmed to The Hill that it is currently under review.

Thune told reporters that the administration has already made significant concessions in an effort to reopen the department and restore pay for Transportation Security Administration agents and other critical personnel.

“I was going over last night some of the gives that the White House had made that went above and beyond any initial offers that they put out there, and there’s a lot of stuff in there,” Thune said.

Among those concessions, Thune said, is a proposal to increase funding for body cameras for federal immigration enforcement officials from $20 million to $100 million. He also noted that the White House has предложed additional oversight measures, including audits by the inspector general to identify “noncompliance.”

“There’s a whole bunch of stuff that have been significant gives on the part of the White House,” Thune added.

Despite those offers, Thune criticized Democrats for prolonging the negotiations.

“But the Democrats seem intent on dragging out this political issue,” he said.

Thune also pointed to the 18-day gap between the White House’s last offer and the Democratic response as evidence of a lack of urgency.

“What they want to do is they want to defund law enforcement. They want to defund ICE, and they want to defund CBP,” he said, referring to Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection. We got to have a meaningful conversation where we sit down at the table and actually work these issues out,” Thune added.

“You can’t get there if you’re not sitting down at the table.”