- - Democratic lawmaker to introduce bill to cripple DHS' ability to detain immigrants

Natasha KoreckiJanuary 21, 2026 at 2:11 AM

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Rep. Delia Ramirez, D-Ill., at a news conference at the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 13. (Heather Diehl / Getty Images) (Heather Diehl)

Rep. Delia Ramirez, D-Ill., plans to introduce a bill Wednesday that would financially cripple the Department of Homeland Security’s ability to detain or monitor immigrants, even as she admits the bill won’t advance unless Democrats take control of the House.

The proposed legislation, a copy of which was first shared with NBC News, would bar DHS from using detention centers or contracting with new ones. It would then redirect that funding to cover health and human services in communities — primarily assisting with health care and housing, as well as other social services — particularly those affected by immigration enforcement now, Ramirez said.

“They believe that there’s no limit to what they could do — there’s no limit to their lawlessness and that as long as they’re masked up and the president continues to justify and call them heroes ... they can do anything,” Ramirez said in an interview.

NBC News has asked DHS for comment.

Republicans hold a slight majority in the House, all but ensuring the bill wouldn’t get called anytime soon.

Still, Ramirez, a Chicago Democrat, said that it was vital that her party begin building a case against the agency ahead of the midterm elections and that she needed time to get buy-in from her colleagues. Top Democrats have cast Immigration and Customs Enforcement as an out-of-control agency that’s overfunded and has little oversight. Ramirez said the timing of the bill’s introduction sends a signal now to angry constituents who are asking their elected leaders in Congress whether they are pushing back against the administration.

“You hear the desperation of our people over and over. What do they say: ‘What the hell is Congress doing? Why won’t they stand up for us? Who is fighting for us? Who will defend us? How could this be legal?’” Ramirez said. “To me, it’s really important for us to demonstrate a sense of urgency, especially right now. Waiting until January of next year to begin introducing, building support, building a case for this is too damn late for us.”

She said it is a tactic similar to one that Republicans tapped with their own initiatives in the past. In 2023, Republicans set the stage for their own push on an overhaul of immigration enforcement — including building a case to eventually impeach then-DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas in 2024.

If Democrats regain a majority in 2027, she said, they’ll be positioned to “move this as quickly as we possibly can.”

The move is the latest iteration of the left’s pushback against a prominent agency within the Department of Homeland Security that is carrying out President Donald Trump’s massive deportation initiative. Congressional Democrats have warned Republicans against fully funding DHS in an upcoming budget fight, with many insisting they would reject any funding bill without policies to restrain immigration officials.

It comes as the nation’s eyes are on Minnesota in the wake of the fatal shooting of Renee Nicole Good by an immigration officer. Protests have broken out throughout the Twin Cities since Good’s death on Jan. 7. Videos have since proliferated in Minneapolis showing aggressive confrontations between immigration agents and protesters. Before that, similar confrontations played out in the Chicago area, including in Ramirez’s district.

There is growing public support for restraining ICE, and recently, one poll, in a shift from 2018, showed more people supported abolishing ICE than keeping it.

But groups like the Democratic think tank Third Way warned that Democrats should avoid using "Abolish ICE" language, which it cast as inflammatory, and instead focus on reforming the agency while maintaining enforcement of immigration laws. In a memo released last week, Third Way argued that using the “abolish ICE” slogan would allow Republicans to shift the conversation away from agency abuses and cast the left as feckless on illegal immigration.

Ramirez disagreed, saying that the proposal wouldn’t suspend security on the country’s southern border and that nothing in the bill would preclude law enforcement from arresting and prosecuting criminals.

"There is already systems in place to do a criminal enforcement," she said. "We're not saying that that system would go away. ICE would go away."

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Source: “AOL Breaking”