As consequences of Homeland Security shutdown become clearer, Congress looks to deal

WASHINGTON — Congress is three days away from a crisis and we’re firmly in the “rhetoric and dire warnings” phase that comes before any potential resolution.

Lawmakers must pass a bill to fund the Department of Homeland Security before this weekend or risk shutting down the department overseeing operations like anti-terrorism operations, border control and disaster recovery. Much of the department would remain operational, but officials say a shutdown would mean employees would go without paychecks or new federal grants for state programs would be delayed.

For Minnesota that means potentially more than a thousand workers forgoing pay and a stream of money worth millions in the past — and in the effort to fund the department, Democrats have raised the specter of a terror attack at the Mall of America to make their point.

The current impasse comes from a dispute over President Obama’s November executive action protecting young undocumented immigrants from deportation. Republicans opposed the measure, and decided to use Congress’ power of the purse as leverage. In December, they funded the whole government for the rest of the year, except for Homeland Security — the agency tasked with carrying out Obama’s immigration order. Homeland Security funding expires at the end of this month.

Republicans had planned to tie future money for the department to measures undoing the executive action. But Democrats have refused to consider any amendments contravening the president’s executive orders, which brings us to where we are today, facing a shutdown of the department.

So this shutdown threat is derived from Congress, which could stop it just as easily. As of Tuesday, that looked a bit more likely, as Senate Republicans said they would uncouple the budget from the immigration measures. Even so, the budget’s next steps are muddled at best, and with time winding down until the second (albeit partial) government shutdown in a year and a half, the warnings of how it would affect the country are flying.

1,700 jobs, $16 million in Minnesota

According to federal data from September, Minnesota has 1,700 Homeland Security employees, including 470 border agents, 150 immigration and customs officials and 950 TSA screeners. Even if Homeland Security goes unfunded, many of these workers, deemed essential, would stay on the job, though they wouldn’t get a paycheck until the shutdown ends (Congress would need to approve back-pay, which would be likely).

Nationally, 75 to 80 percent of Homeland Security’s 23,000 personnel would keep going to work, Secretary Jeh Johnson said in a briefing with reporters on Tuesday (The Washington Post looked at the effects of the 2013 shutdown on Homeland Security employment on Tuesday).

A shutdown could also impede the department’s ability to process and award grant funding to state and local law enforcement. Johnson said he is pushing Congress to pass a budget bill, without immigration provisions attached, to fund the department through the end of the fiscal year (in September). Without that type of budgetary stability, Johnson said, the department can’t run its grant programs, which sent $2.5 billion to states last year for things like surveillance and communications equipment or supplies for first responders.

Last year, Minnesota received more than $16 million in total grant money, according to numbers from the Federal Emergency Management Agency. That money wouldn’t be affected, but a shutdown could delay new grant processing.

“A lot of the Department of Homeland Security’s mission is our grant-making activity,” Johnson said. “Given how our challenges in homeland security are evolving, we have to rely more and more in our partnerships in state and local law enforcement.”

Democrats highlight Mall of America threat

Democrats are making a point to warn about all of these downfalls. A group of senators held a press conference Tuesday with first responders who have gotten grant money warning about the impact of delaying future funding, and some Minnesota Democrats are using a local concern to make their case: this weekend’s video from Somali militant group al-Shabab calling for an attack against Bloomington’s Mall of America.

In floor speeches Tuesday, both Sen. Al Franken and Rep. Betty McCollum said the threat of violence against the mall should be enough for Congress to action on the Homeland Security budget.

They followed Sen. Amy Klobuchar, who took to the floor Monday and pointedly called on Republicans to drop their immigration concerns and fund the department.

“Rather than acting to protect my state from the threat, there are people who are actively contemplating a shutdown of the Department of Homeland Security — the Department we created after 9/11 to protect our homeland, to protect our country from these kinds of terrorist threats,” Klobuchar said. “The people in my state are standing tall when it comes to this threat, and our law enforcement is standing tall when it comes to this threat, but in Congress our message to these terrorists cannot be that we are going to shut down the Department of Homeland Security. That cannot be the message coming from the Senate of the United States of America.”

On Tuesday, Johnson wouldn’t expand on his weekend statement that shoppers be “particularly careful” going to the Mall of America (Officials later clarified to say there was no specific threat to the mall, despite the video). On the broader matter of an expanded terror threat without DHS funding, Johnson said that an “independent actor could strike any community with little or not notice to our intelligence community,” making the department’s coordination with local officials all the more important.

“A shutdown of the Department of Homeland Security has real consequences to homeland security and public safety, period, end of sentence,” he said.

McConnell charts a path forward

Congress usually — eventually — finds its way out of its (self-inflicted) budget quandaries, and there’s already an effort underway to do that this week.

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said Tuesday he will offer up a Homeland Security funding bill alongside, but separate from, a measure to defund Obama’s executive actions. The plan would mean Congress could pass Homeland Security’s funding to avoid a shutdown, then fight over the immigration actions separately. It also means Democrats could still oppose Republicans’ immigration measures — and Obama could veto them — without threating Homeland Security funding, preserving the status quo over Republican objections.

The House would then have to take up a “clean” funding bill, something that could enrage conservatives deeply opposed to the executive actions. But House Speaker John Boehner has a history of cutting budget deals without buy-in from his right flank. A spokesman for Boehner put out a statement Monday that didn’t endorse or indict McConnell’s plan, saying instead that it would force Democrats to go on the record for or against the executive actions without Homeland Security funding on the line. In the past, Boehner had said that the House has ruled on the question of immigration and Homeland Security by passing its bill to fund the department while gutting Obama’s immigration executive actions, and the problem was now the Senate’s.

Despite weeks worth of finger pointing between the House and Senate, Johnson said he’s optimistic lawmakers will find a way to cut a deal before the shutdown clock hits zero.

“Almost everybody agrees that the Department of Homeland Security should be funded, one way or another,” he said. “We’ve heard from various members of congressional leadership that we are not going to let a shutdown happen. That’s what I continue to hear.”

Devin Henry can be reached at dhenry@minnpost.com. Follow him on Twitter: @dhenry