The Impact of DHS Shutdown on Both Parties, Daily Life

And a partial government shutdown went in effect for the Department of Homeland Security on Saturday. Republicans couldn't get to the 60-vote threshold to create a stopgap funding bill with their Democrat counterparts. Democrat leadership says they are looking for more reform in the operations of ICE officers. In addition to ICE, DHS is in charge of TSA at the airports, the Secret Service, FEMA, which responds to emergencies, and the Coast Guard. Joining us to discuss the implications for daily life is Andrew Arthur. He's a fellow in law and policy at the Center for Immigration Studies, as well as a former immigration judge. Andrew, thank you for joining us this morning. What will be the impact of this shutdown? Well, you know, it's a great question, Kerry, because DHS only represents 4% of the federal budget. But you've detailed some of the critical activities that they do. TSA, we all interact with them whenever we go to the airport. And I hope, like me, you're as nice to them because they get plenty of hate during the day. Secret Service, not simply the Secret Service for Donald Trump and his family, Melania Trump, but also for Barack Obama and his wife, Michelle, for Bill Clinton and his wife, Hillary. You know, we talk about port security. Right now, we're in the midst of an economic boom. But if those critical port security duties can't be carried out, then, you know, there's a possibility it's going to put a damper on the economy. It's going to send our productivity down. It's going to make life harder for ordinary Americans. So 4% of the budget, but they perform some of the most crucial duties that the government assigns. Yes, certainly, as you mentioned, while it's a small portion of the government, a very critical portion of the government, and it serves the American people in a variety of very important ways. FEMA, of course, with these winter storms. So, Andrew, how do you see this shutdown coming to an end? So it's going to go one of two ways, Kerry. Either this thing is going to be resolved by the end of the week. There will be some, you know, agreements made about how ICE and CBP will carry out their duties. Or alternatively, this thing will stretch out for six to eight weeks. The pain, the pressure on the American people will get higher. The pressure on the Trump administration will get more severe. But as we saw at the end of the last government shutdown, nothing really was resolved. None of the wish list that the Democrats that refused to fund the government wanted actually came to pass. Really, the only thing that it did was it inflicted harm on the Republican Party. And potentially, that is the intent of this shutdown. I hope it's not. I hope that this isn't simple partisan politics, because, you know, the country's going well. We need to keep it going well. We don't need a blip like this, especially, as you mentioned, with FEMA, with storm season coming up in the spring, especially in the Midwest. And of course, we saw some horrible storms here in the east. So, you know, we need to keep the money flowing. Hopefully, they'll come to an agreement. Again, it's either going to end in a week or it's going to take two months. I want to dig into your point just there. You said the last shutdown hurt the Republican Party. And I was curious, do you find that one party is hurt more as these shutdowns continue, especially if, you know, for example, it seems like not having body cams on the ICE officers was something that everybody could agree that was a gap. But with the doxing and the attacks on ICE officers up, you know, several thousand percent, you know, it would seem unreasonable to not allow these people to have their anonymity. So could you talk on that with your experience with immigration enforcement, but also to which political party you feel loses more should this shutdown go beyond the end of this week? So I'm going to answer the second question first. Inevitably, Republicans suffer whenever the government shuts down. Whenever Democrats control the White House and the Congress, Republicans are blamed as obstructionists. Whenever Republicans control those bodies, then the argument is made, well, you actually have all the power. Why couldn't you just keep the government open? The media is not exactly, you know, even-handed with due respect as it relates to these issues. Now, when you talk about the masks and the doxing, let's just go back a little bit, Kerry. There was an assassination attempt that a gunman attempted to carry out on the Dallas ICE office. People forget that. There was a coordinated attack on an ICE detention facility in Alvarado, Texas. People forget about that. There was a lone gunman who attempted to shoot up the Border Patrol station in McGowan. That seems to have been forgotten. And yeah, doxing is up 8,000 percent. Attacks are up somewhere around 1,500 to 2,000 percent. So there are a lot of officers, a lot of agents who have targets on their back. Tom Homan certainly gets his fair share of death threats. So this is a real salient issue. And I think that, you know, ideally, the one thing that would happen is everybody would tone down the rhetoric. We've definitely seen a different enforcement posture ever since Borders are Tom Homan went to Minneapolis. But the rhetoric continues. And now we have a lot of states that are, you know, creating their own ice watches, official ice watches, where in real time they're going to keep track of what's going on. That can only end in tragedy for the officers and in many instances can only end in tragedy for the immigrants, too, when people attempt to interpose themselves in the middle of those debates. So until the adults enter the room and again, maybe that'll happen by the end of this week. Maybe that won't happen until sometime in April. This really isn't going to get resolved, but we need to have a national conversation on it. Perhaps some good can come of this. We can have that national conversation and move forward. Is there anything that we can learn from the last shutdown as a way to bring this to a more expedient conclusion? Well, unfortunately, Democrats probably learned all the wrong lessons from the last shutdown. Democrats in the Virginia midterm elections wiped out Republicans. Republicans lost 15 seats in the House of Delegates. And now we see Democratic Governor Abigail Spanberger attempting to redistrict the Old Dominion so that Republicans only have one seat left. The same thing happened in New Jersey where Mikey Sherrill cruised to what was supposed to be a very tight election to victory. So as long as there are rewards to be had from shutting down the government, shutdowns are going to continue. Hopefully, Democrats will listen to people like Rahm Emanuel, former White House chief of staff, people like John Fetterman, senator from Pennsylvania, realize that shutdowns are never good for the American people, even if they do hold some temporary partisan advantage. But these are contentious times, Kerry. And unfortunately, neither party wants to give a step. Don't be surprised, though, if you don't see Donald Trump himself step in, get involved in the negotiations, get something done. Andrew Arthur, thanks for joining and sharing your insights. Thanks so much for having me, Kerry.