Last week, the Senate unanimously passed a bill to reopen the Department of Homeland Security except for its immigration-related functions. House Republicans angrily rejected it, and it seemed the shutdown might drag on indefinitely. Then, with no warning, House Speaker Mike Johnson and Senate Majority Leader John Thune announced late on Wednesday that they had reached an agreement to do it the Senate’s way after all. So now Johnson will try to get the House to approve the Senate-passed bill, though he called the measure “a joke” recently enough that the words are still echoing in the Capitol.

What changed so abruptly? Well, officially the GOP explanation is that President Donald Trump gave restive conservatives some assurance that their vicious buddies in ICE and CBP will get years of assured funding — without any restrictions on their conduct — via a party-line budget-reconciliation bill that he wants on his desk by June 1, as he announced on Truth Social earlier on Wednesday. Trump did not announce that part of the deal involves House Republicans abandoning their fight to keep the rest of DHS shuttered until new ICE/CBP money is safely in the barn. But the speed with which Johnson caved to Thune suggested some sort of firm message was sent by the White House to end the foolishness.

There are some problems, though. The House and Senate are enjoying a two-week Easter recess, and the only way to clear legislation when they are away is via a unanimous consent motion. Early on Thursday morning, the Senate did its part by again passing the bill to reopen DHS on a voice vote in a near-empty chamber. But stopping the maneuver in the House will take just one House Freedom Caucus member who wants to play to the MAGA grandstands by objecting to it. While it’s not entirely clear yet what Johnson’s strategy will be, he is probably rallying support for an abrupt surrender on DHS in anticipation of a vote when the recess ends on April 13. So the agony of unpaid and sidelined DHS employees will likely continue until then and, with it, the possibility that the deal will fall apart all over again.

One source of continued anxiety among Republicans is the scope of the reconciliation bill Trump has demanded. His Truth Social post seemed to contemplate a narrow bill aimed strictly at pre-funding immigration enforcement for three years so that even if Democrats flip the House in November, the masked agents of nativist fury won’t run out of money while Trump is in office. But this could be the last opportunity Republicans have until 2029 to enact any meaningful legislation that can skirt the Senate filibuster and thus require Democratic support, which remains an abomination to the GOP. So there will be many efforts to stuff the next Big Beautiful Bill with right-wing policy priorities. Some might come from Trump himself, who will be tempted to use reconciliation to obtain some money for his Iran adventure; to pass elements of his otherwise dead-in-the-water SAVE America Act; or indeed to begin implementing his alleged Great Healthcare Plan by repealing the Affordable Care Act. So Republican leaders really do need to reach a quick agreement on what the new package will and won’t include and stick to it ruthlessly if there is any hope of meeting Trump’s June 1 deadline.

But even before this new legislative nightmare takes shape, Trump may have to keep his foot on the necks of Johnson and House Freedom Caucus troublemakers if he doesn’t want the DHS funding sideshow, with its embarrassing signs of Republican disarray, to return. For their part, congressional Democrats might want to put the kibosh on excessive gloating before the deal is done in the House. Right now, they are entitled to feel pretty good about having forced Republicans to blink first on DHS despite all the predictions that enough of them would cave to give Republicans the power to reopen the department on their own terms. Now if the latest deal sticks, they can end the longest partial government shutdown in history without concessions on ICE, then stand by and watch as Republicans struggle to get another Big Beautiful Bill over the finish line. It’s what passes for a victory when you are on the wrong end of a governing trifecta, and it may be the last time Democrats make any sort of mark in Congress before the midterms.

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