President Donald Trump has formally told the Department of Homeland Security to pay TSA despite a funding lapse after agents missed another paycheck.
In a presidential memorandum Friday, Trump directed Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin and Russell Vought, the director of the White House’s Office of Management and Budget, to use undisclosed funds to pay TSA employees, including 50,000 security officers at airports.
It’s been about six weeks since the start of the partial government shutdown, which has seen airports hit with excruciatingly long security lines. Democrats have refused to fund DHS, which TSA is part of, until there are reforms to Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection.
While TSA agents have quit or called out of work due to missing paychecks, immigration agents are still getting paid thanks to funding from the president’s “big beautiful” bill signed last summer. Trump sent immigration agents to airports to help out, though they haven’t really impacted wait times that much.
It’s unclear where the funds to pay TSA will come from. Trump wrote in the memorandum that he was directing Mullin and Vought to use “funds that have a reasonable and logical nexus to TSA operations.”
The Independent has reached out to the White House’s Office of Management and Budget for comment.
Trump used the memorandum to bash what he called the “Democrat-caused shutdown.”
“If Democrats in the Congress will not act to honor the service of our TSA officers, who are now performing their critical public safety responsibilities without knowing whether they will be able to buy food for their families or pay their rent, then my Administration will take action,” the president wrote, adding that the current circumstances “constitute an emergency situation compromising the Nation’s security.”
Trump said nearly 500 TSA agents have quit and thousands more have called out sick “at record rates” since they couldn’t be paid. Friday reportedly marks another payday missed during the shutdown.
“Security wait times at some airports have reached untenable lengths of three or more hours,” the memorandum read. “These increased wait times, combined with declining morale among TSA staff, unacceptably heighten the risk of security vulnerabilities within our domestic travel system and has negatively impacted countless Americans.”
DHS wrote on X Friday that TSA agents should start getting paid as soon as Monday.
“TSA is grateful to the President and Secretary for their leadership to put money back into the pockets of TSA employees who worked without pay during the ongoing Democrat DHS shutdown,” the agency said.
The Senate passed a bill early Friday morning that would have funded most of the agency, including TSA, but Trump told Fox News’ Jacqui Heinrich it “wasn’t appropriate” since it didn’t include funding for ICE and CBP.
House Speaker Mike Johnson also lambasted the bill Friday, telling reporters he will hold a vote on a different bill to fully fund DHS for 60 days “as soon as possible.”
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer said a 60-day continuing resolution that “locks in the status quo is dead on arrival in the Senate.”
“We’ve been clear from day one: Democrats will fund critical Homeland Security functions—but we will not give a blank check to Trump’s lawless and deadly immigration militia without reforms,” Schumer said in a statement.
The Trump administration has received backlash for its massive immigration crackdown, which critics say uses aggressive tactics. U.S. citizens Renee Good and Alex Pretti were gunned down in the streets of Minneapolis by immigration agents in January, causing public uproar. The administration framed both shootings as self-defense.
Speaking to reporters at Joint Base Andrews in Maryland before departing for Miami Friday, Trump said, “The Democrats want to let illegals come into the country, criminals, murderers, every kind of criminal you can imagine, and the Republicans just don’t want to have it happen.”
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