Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem pushed House lawmakers to pass a $175 billion funding bill for the Department of Homeland Security during her appearance before appropriators, saying the money would be used to “empower” the government to carry out President Donald Trump’s extensive immigration agenda.

Noem went before the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Homeland Security on Tuesday to defend the White House’s massive budget request: $175 billion for the 270,000-person federal department. DHS’s responsibilities largely overlap with Trump’s immigration and border policies, making it the primary department to carry out those objectives.

Recommended Stories

• Intelligence memo disputes Trump claim that Tren de Aragua is coordinating with Venezuela
• Visit to border revealed 'remarkable' shift between Biden and Trump: Lankford
• Nearly 50 illegal immigrants arrested in Southeast with money and guns

“The president’s FY 2026 Budget request for DHS will establish a firm foundation upon which to surge resources in support of the Administration’s border security and immigration enforcement objectives,” Noem’s prepared statement stated. “Reconciliation would empower the DHS to implement the President’s mass removal campaign and secure the border.”

Although the Trump administration has initially had success ending the illegal immigration crisis in the first 100 days of his term, it wants to fund the expansion of border security and continue carrying out the promised “largest-ever” deportation operation. Democrats repeatedly shared concerns about how the DHS wanted to fund those plans.

Funding plans released by the House Judiciary Committee and House Homeland Security Committee last week included $47 billion for more border wall, as well as the first-ever hundreds of miles of maritime barrier.

Absent adequate detention space, access to airplanes, and a sufficient number of federal immigration officers, the Trump administration has been held up moving on its Day One agenda until Congress loosens the purse strings.

Trump has eyed removing 1 million people in year one, but U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement had removed 65,000 as of late April.

Another $10 billion would go toward upgrading U.S. Customs and Border Protection facilities where illegal immigrants are temporarily detained, hiring and retaining CBP employees, more nonintrusive machines to screen vehicles and cargo at ports of entry, the drone program, and border surveillance technology.

Republicans pitched enough funding in the reconciliation bill to carry out at least one million deportations of illegal immigrants, hire 10,000 new ICE employees, and enough detention space to house 100,000 people at a time, doubling the current amount.

Rep. Ed Case (D-HI) questioned why the DHS needed billions more dollars than in past years when it had already addressed the border crisis at current funding levels.

“You are claiming such success at the border without spending all of this extra money,” Case said in the hearing.

Rep. Rosa DeLauro (D-CT) pushed Noem for information on her plans for DHS agency Federal Emergency Management Agency given that Trump has teased closing it and requiring states to handle natural disaster responses.

“What is your plan with regard to FEMA? Are you planning to eliminate FEMA?” DeLauro asked.

Noem said she would provide a written response but that there were “thousands and thousands” of areas within FEMA that required addressing.

Rep. Lauren Underwood (D-IL), the subcommittee’s acting ranking member, told Noem she was concerned about the department using funding to deport U.S. citizens following the recent departures of three U.S. citizen children whose parents were illegal immigrants and chose to take their young children with them.

“Do you believe that the U.S. government has the authority to deport American citizens?” Underwood asked.

VISIT TO BORDER REVEALED ‘REMARKABLE’ SHIFT BETWEEN BIDEN AND TRUMP: LANKFORD

“No. We are not deporting American citizens,” Noem said.

“That oath that we both swore before taking office was to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States, not the president, not a political party, the Constitution,” Underwood said. “That’s what we’re going to keep doing here at the Appropriations Committee.”