Not Fucking Likely

Ted Cruz and John Kennedy want people to believe they have a clever little two-step: fund TSA and the rest of Homeland Security now, then come back later and fund ICE through reconciliation with Republican votes only. Kennedy himself described exactly that plan, saying he and Cruz wanted to accept Democratic funding for everything but ICE, then use reconciliation later to do whatever they wanted on ICE.


That sounds copacetic until you run it through actual Senate procedure instead of the Fox News noise machine. Reconciliation is not a magic word you can say five times like "Candyman" and make the filibuster disappear. It has to be triggered by a budget resolution.

That matters.

You gotta shoot your shot
To get what ya want
What ya got
Shoot your shot
    -Bootsy's Rubber Band

The problem is Republicans already "shot their shot." They used the FY2025 reconciliation vehicle to pass the "One Big Beautiful Bill." So if Cruz and Kennedy want another run at reconciliation, they need a new vehicle, which means a new budget resolution, most likely for FY2026. Not a continuing resolution. Not a press release. Not Ted Cruz talking like he just found a pot of gold under the Capitol rainbow (and rainbows are too woke for Ted Cruz anyway).

But here is the bigger problem, and it is the one they are hoping nobody notices: reconciliation is not for ordinary discretionary appropriations. It is for changes in the debt limit, revenues, and direct or mandatory spending. So when Cruz and Kennedy talk about “funding ICE,” what most people hear is normal operating money for ICE. That is exactly the sort of thing reconciliation is not designed to do.

And even if they tried some political sleight of logic to create some narrower budget gimmick, they still have to survive the Byrd Rule, which allows provisions to be stripped if they are not really budgetary enough. Again, that is not some tiny footnote. That is the trap door. A lot of what Republicans want from ICE is not just money. It is policy, enforcement posture, and performative cruelty marketed as seriousness. That kind of thing can run face-first into Byrd Rule challenges.

So no, this is not a clean backup plan. It is not some ace in the hole. It is a talking point wearing procedural makeup. To make it work, they would need a new budget resolution, a reconciliation bill crafted to fit rules that do not favor ordinary ICE funding, and enough discipline to survive Senate scrutiny.

That is not impossible in the way cold fusion is impossible. But as a real-world plan?

Not fucking likely.

I'm just saying.

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