House likely to vote on DHS funding bill without immigration provisions

US House of Representatives Speaker John Boehner on Tuesday reportedly told his fellow Republicans that the House will be voting later in the day on a crucial Senate bill intended to provide funding to the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) for the complete fiscal year without lodging any restriction on President Barack Obama’s executive actions on immigration.

According to the members present at the meeting, the vote is expected to end the ongoing legislative conflict between Republicans and Democrats over the DHS funding.

The security department, which spearheads domestic counterterrorism operations, will run out of funds at midnight on Friday.

Conservative Republicans in House have demanded for the inclusion of language in the spending legislation that would block Obama’s executive actions that would lift the deportation threat for millions of undocumented people in the country. But President Obama and his Democratic leaders have supported the so-called ‘clean’ DHS funding bill which has been already passed by the Senate.

Last Friday, the House resorted to a temporary solution and passed the bill for one-week spending fix when just few hours were left for funding lapse. The House voted 357-60 for the bill and temporarily averted the shutdown.

The Senate-passed bill, which includes the immigration provisions, has been repeatedly blocked by Republican Democrats.

The bill will provide approximately USD 40 billion in funding for the security agency that secures American borders, coastal waters and airports. In the dearth of enough funds, the security agency would be forced to send its nearly 30,000 employees, or around 15 percent of its total workforce, on furlough.