House Votes to End 76-Day DHS Shutdown, Sends Funding Bill to Trump

The House of Representatives approved a bill on April 30, 2026 to restore funding for most of the Department of Homeland Security, ending a 76-day partial shutdown that officials and news reports described as the longest agency funding lapse in U.S. history. The measure passed by voice vote and now heads to President Donald Trump for signature, according to CBS News. The legislation funds the bulk of DHS operations but explicitly excludes immigration enforcement, leaving that funding fight to a separate legislative track.

The Details

The House cleared the bill nearly five weeks after the Senate had passed the same measure unanimously. House Speaker Mike Johnson said the vote would prevent disruptions at airport security checkpoints and guarantee paychecks for federal workers across the department. 'We were not going to have lines at TSA. Everybody will get their paychecks now,' Johnson said, as reported by BBC News.

The bill funds most DHS agencies but carves out immigration enforcement operations. According to POLITICO, funding for Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the immigration-enforcement functions of Customs and Border Protection was deliberately excluded from the package. Republicans are pursuing a separate party-line reconciliation measure designed to secure tens of billions of dollars for ICE and Border Patrol through the remainder of Trump's second term, CBS News reported. That effort is ongoing and was not resolved by Wednesday's vote.

DHS had been without routine funding since February 14, 2026, according to PBS News and the Associated Press. That 76-day gap made the shutdown the longest for any single federal agency in U.S. history. The lapse strained multiple non-enforcement DHS components, including the Transportation Security Administration, the Coast Guard, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the Secret Service, and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, POLITICO reported.

Administration officials had warned in recent weeks that the temporary payroll funds the White House directed DHS to use were nearly exhausted, according to CBS News. With those reserves running low, pressure mounted on the House to act before agencies began missing payroll.

Top House Democratic appropriator Rosa DeLauro offered a terse response to the outcome: 'It is about damn time,' she said in comments reported by PBS News and the Associated Press. Senate Democratic appropriator Patty Murray focused on the weeks lost to House inaction. 'This is the same bill the Senate unanimously passed five weeks ago,' Murray said, according to BBC News.

Context

The DHS funding fight played out against a broader political battle over immigration enforcement that has defined much of the Trump administration's second-term legislative agenda. Democrats refused to support new immigration-enforcement funding without additional guardrails following fatal shootings in Minnesota involving federal immigration officers, according to BBC News. That standoff drove the record-setting lapse and ultimately forced Republican leaders to decouple non-enforcement DHS funding from the immigration debate in order to move any bill at all.

The shutdown affected agencies central to domestic security and disaster response. FEMA, the Coast Guard, and CISA — which handles election security and critical infrastructure defense — all operated under the strain of the funding gap, according to POLITICO. The Secret Service, responsible for protecting senior government officials, was also affected. Trump had previously directed DHS to draw on temporary funds to keep essential personnel working, but administration officials warned those reserves were close to running dry before the House acted, CBS News reported.

Republicans are pursuing a separate reconciliation bill that would fund ICE and Border Patrol at elevated levels through the rest of Trump's term without requiring Democratic votes, according to CBS News. That measure remains in progress and was not part of the legislation that passed Wednesday.

What's Next

The bill now awaits President Trump's signature before DHS agencies can resume standard-funded operations. No signing timeline was reported by the sources consulted. Once signed, agencies including TSA, the Coast Guard, FEMA, the Secret Service, and CISA can return to routine funding arrangements and personnel can expect regular paychecks.

The separate Republican reconciliation effort to fund ICE and Border Patrol remains in progress, according to CBS News. That measure would advance through a party-line vote process that does not require Democratic support. The resolution of immigration enforcement funding is expected to be a central element of Republican budget negotiations through the remainder of Trump's term, with Democrats continuing to push for additional guardrails.