Reconciliation Recommendations of the House Committee on Homeland Security

Legislation Summary

H. Con. Res. 14, the Concurrent Resolution on the Budget for Fiscal Year 2025, instructed the House Committee on Homeland Security to recommend legislative changes that would increase deficits up to a specified amount over the 2025-2034 period. As part of the reconciliation process, the House Committee on Homeland Security approved legislation on April 29, 2025, that would increase deficits.

Estimated Federal Cost

The reconciliation recommendations of the House Committee on Homeland Security would increase deficits by $67.1 billion over the 2025-2034 period. The estimated budgetary effects of the legislation are shown in Table 1. The costs of the legislation fall within budget functions 450 (community and regional development) and 750 (administration of justice).

Basis of Estimate

For this estimate, CBO assumes that the legislation will be enacted in summer 2025. CBO’s estimates are relative to its January 2025 baseline and cover the period from 2025 through 2034. Outlays of appropriated amounts were estimated using historical obligation and spending rates for similar programs.

Direct Spending

Enacting this legislation would increase direct spending by $67.1 billion over the 2025-2034 period (see Table 2). All of that amount would result from specified direct appropriations for activities performed by Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA).

Border Barrier System Construction, Invasive Species, and Border Security Facilities Improvements. Section 60001 would appropriate $51.6 billion for border barrier system construction and related activities, increasing outlays by $49.7 billion over the 2025-2034 period, CBO estimates.

Border Barrier System and Technology. The legislation would appropriate $46.5 billion for CBP to construct, upgrade, and replace components of the barrier system along the southwestern, northern, and maritime borders of the United States.

Based on an analysis of information from CBP and historical rates of spending on border construction projects, CBO estimates that enacting the provision would increase outlays by $44.6 billion over the 2025-2034 period.

CBO expects that all of the funds provided by the legislation will be obligated before the period of availability expires at the end of 2029. However, we do not expect that all funds will be spent during the 2025-2034 period based on the historical spending patterns for other federal construction projects and because the pace of spending for construction projects typically spans more than five years from the time funds are obligated. (Under the rules that govern the federal budget, CBP would need to return any unspent funds to the Treasury on September 30, 2034.)

CBP Facilities and Checkpoints and Invasive Species Eradication. The legislation also would appropriate $5.0 billion for CBP to lease, acquire, and construct new facilities and checkpoints, and to upgrade or replace existing facilities and $50 million to eradicate invasive plant species along the border, increasing outlays by those amounts over the 2025‑2034 period.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection Personnel and Fleet Vehicles. Section 60002 would appropriate $8.3 billion for CBP to recruit, hire, and train, personnel and to procure new vehicles and technology, increasing outlays by $8.3 billion over the 2025-2034 period.

CBP Personnel and Training. The legislation would appropriate the following amounts for CBP personnel and training:

• $4.1 billion for CBP to hire, train, and, in some cases, rehire federal employees as border patrol agents, field operations officers, air and marine agents, and support staff; and
• $2.1 billion for signing and retention bonuses.

CBP currently employs about 19,000 border patrol agents, 26,000 officers, and 1,400 air and marine operators. The agency indicates that the funding provided by the legislation would be used to hire approximately 8,500 employees, including 5,000 officers and 3,000 border patrol agents. Using information from the agency, CBO expects that officers and agents would be hired gradually over the next 10 years, with most additions occurring in the next five years, and that enacting this provision would increase outlays by $6.2 billion over the 2025-2034 period.

Training, Recruitment, and Screening and Patrol Vehicle Procurement. Additionally, the legislation would appropriate the following amounts, increasing outlays equal to the appropriated amounts over the 2025-2034 period:

• $750 million for CBP to train staff at Federal Law Enforcement Training Centers and to improve those facilities;
• $600 million for marketing, recruitment, applicant screening, and programs to facilitate staff reassignments and relocation; and
• $813 million for CBP to lease or purchase patrol vehicles.

U.S. Customs and Border Protection Technology, National Vetting Center, and Other Efforts to Enhance Border Security. Section 60003 would appropriate $6.3 billion for CBP to procure, upgrade, and integrate new technology into the border control system, increasing outlays by $6.3 billion over the 2025-2034 period.

The funding would include:

• $4.5 billion for surveillance towers, linear ground detection systems, nonintrusive inspection systems, and scanners for the agency’s biometric entry and exit program;
• $1.2 billion for CBP to acquire or upgrade various air and marine systems, including aircraft, watercraft, and unmanned aircraft systems, which CBO expects would be procured in bulk purchases; and
• $517 million for other CBP activities, including funds to combat drug trafficking, to support screening of applicants by the National Vetting Center, and for other activities including commemorations of events related to border security.

State and Local Law Enforcement Presidential Residence Protection. Section 60004 would appropriate $300 million for the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) to reimburse state and local law enforcement agencies for costs incurred to protect the private residences of the President, increasing outlays by $300 million over the 2025-2034 period. Most of those amounts would cover overtime pay for officers and other personnel.

State Homeland Security Grant Program. Section 60005 would appropriate $2.6 billion for FEMA to support state and local law enforcement agencies addressing security threats, increasing outlays by $2.6 billion over the 2025-2034 period.

The funding would include:

• $1 billion to reimburse state and local governments for security, planning, and other costs related to hosting the 2028 Olympic Games;
• $625 million for similar activities for the 2026 FIFA World Cup;
• $500 million for FEMA to enhance state and local governments’ detection and monitoring of threats from unmanned aircraft systems; and
• $450 million for the Operation Stonegarden Grant Program, which covers costs for personnel and equipment incurred by state and local governments as part of joint operations to secure U.S. borders.

Uncertainty

Significant uncertainty surrounds CBO’s projections of the pace at which CBP would obligate funds and the total amount the agency could spend by 2034 to construct walls, fences, facilities, and checkpoints for the border barrier system. These amounts significantly exceed amounts previously provided for similar activities. For example, over the 2018‑2021 period, lawmakers appropriated about $5.5 billion for physical barriers on the southwestern border of the United States. By the end of 2024, CBP had spent roughly $2.6 billion—less than half of the amount provided.

How quickly funds provided in this legislation would be spent will depend on factors that include the availability of contractors; fluctuations in the cost and availability of materials; and CBP’s ability to acquire private land or obtain access to state, local, or tribal property.

Based on information from the agency, CBO expects that some stages of the process could progress more quickly than they might have in the past—many aspects of planning, land acquisition, and permitting for certain segments of the border have been completed or streamlined. However, the pace of spending on construction funded by the legislation is uncertain and the total amounts spent over the 2025-2034 period could be larger or smaller than CBO estimates here.

Considerable uncertainty also surrounds projections of the pace at which CBP would hire new personnel, particularly border patrol agents and officers. Although the legislation would provide funding for signing and retention bonuses and increase spending on marketing, recruitment, and screening of new employees, significant uncertainty exists about how responsive the labor supply might be to fill those positions. In recent years, because of background checks, training requirements, and other pre-employment processes, the time to recruit and hire new officers has ranged from 300 to 600 days. As a result, the pace of spending on personnel over the 2025-2034 period could be faster or slower than CBO estimates here.

Pay-As-You-Go Considerations

The Statutory Pay-As-You-Go Act of 2010 establishes budget-reporting and enforcement procedures for legislation affecting direct spending or revenues. The net changes in outlays that are subject to those pay-as-you-go procedures are shown in Table 1.

Increase in Long-Term Net Direct Spending and Deficits

CBO estimates that enacting the legislation would not increase net direct spending or on‑budget deficits in any of the four consecutive 10-year periods beginning in 2035.

Mandates

The legislation contains no intergovernmental or private-sector mandates as defined in the Unfunded Mandates Reform Act.

Federal Costs:

Jeremy Crimm (for Customs and Border Protection)
Jon Sperl (for Customs and Border Protection, and Federal Emergency Management Agency)

Mandates: Rachel Austin

Estimate Reviewed By

Justin Humphrey
Chief, Finance, Housing, and Education Cost Estimates Unit

Kathleen FitzGerald
Chief, Public and Private Mandates Unit

Christina Hawley Anthony
Deputy Director of Budget Analysis

H. Samuel Papenfuss 
Deputy Director of Budget Analysis

Chad Chirico 
Director of Budget Analysis

[Table 2 begins on the next page.]

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