As the federal government heads towards a potential shutdown starting on Wednesday, the Department of Homeland Security assures that immigration and border operations will continue, but said that those frontline workers could be going without pay.
DHS noted in a statement to Fox News Digital on Tuesday that Customs and Border Protection, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the U.S. Coast Guard and Transportation Security Administration will continue their "critical functions," including ICE being able to "arrest and deport violent criminal aliens" and CBP being able to "screen goods and people" entering the U.S.
The agency also noted that the officer hiring processes will still continue, including for recruitment.
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Secret Service surveils the desert from land and air along the U.S.-Mexico border on August 22, 2024 south of Sierra Vista, Arizona. (Rebecca Noble/Getty Images)
"While these critical operations continue, Democrats are forcing many of our nearly 200,000 frontline officers, emergency responders and employees to continue secur[ing] the Homeland without pay," DHS Assistant Secretary Tricia McLaughlin said in a statement.
"Far-left politicians demonize our employees everyday which has led to a 1,000% increase in assault[s] on our law enforcement. Now they are holding hostage their family’s finances and jeopardizing their welfare. This is unacceptable," she continued.
As of Tuesday afternoon, it seems extremely likely that the government will shut down, which would be the last one since the end of 2018 going into early 2019, during President Donald Trump’s first term. There were also lengthy shutdowns during the Obama and Clinton administrations.
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U.S. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) walks to speak at a news conference following the weekly Senate Democratic policy luncheon at the U.S. Capitol on June 17, 2025, in Washington, D.C. (Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)
"The Trump Administration wants a straightforward and clean CR to continue funding the government – the exact same proposal that Democrats supported just 6 months ago, 13 times under the Biden Administration. But radical Democrats are threatening to shut the government down if they don’t get their nearly $1.5 trillion wish list of demands, including free health care for illegal aliens," White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson stated.
"The Democrat’s radical agenda was rejected by the American people less than a year ago at the ballot box, now they’re trying to shut down the government and hold the American people hostage over it," Jackson added.
Meanwhile, Democrats in Congress have said that Republicans should bear the blame for the shutdown.
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Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D) dismissed the girl murdered by an MS-13 migrant as a "random dead person" in a House Judiciary Committee markup. (Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)
"Republicans would rather shut down the government than protect the Affordable Care Act. A shutdown puts ACA tax credits at risk—and in Texas, premiums could jump 289%, costing families $459 more each year," Rep. Jasmine Crockett, D-Texas, posted to X on Tuesday.
"They passed up multiple chances to extend them in the Big Beautiful Bill; they chose not to. Families shouldn't have to pay the price for their political games," the Democrat wrote.