Sure, ICE need to be reined in. But calling for "defunding" is almost as silly as calling for defunding of the police.

Yes and no. I'll link a piece from John Oliver below. I agree with the stance that saving ICE is almost impossible at this point. It needs to go, but its proper duties need to continue in another agency. Sort of like the German secret service isn't called the "gestapo" anymore, for obvious reasons. We came to this point, at least in part, because of the creation of DHS. It's our largest agency, and was cobbled together in a haphazard way. ICE can't receive any more funding. Its legitimate tasks need to be folded into another service.

Refusing to pay people's salaries is immoral, in my opinion. Democrats are screwing up, yet again. They'll cave like last time.

People that should be fired anyway, in the case of ICE. Otherwise, I agree with your sentiment. I also don't like shutdowns, and our funding processes shouldn't be set up to allow that. Congress should be required to be in session until they have a proper budget, even if it takes them until the next election (i.e. they don't get to go home until they do it). But that's another thread. Just as the complete reorganization of DHS is another thread.

This was very illuminating:
YouTube: ICE & DHS: Last Week Tonight with John Oliver (HBO) (LastWeekTonight)

I'll likely always vote Dem, but I do not want to be publicly associated with this current bunch of gas-lighting clowns.

I used to register as "independent", but in AZ that meant I couldn't vote in any of the primaries. So, I had to pick which primary I wanted to vote in. The party of Christian Soldiers was out (later MAGA), so here I am. Neither party really represents me, but Dems are closer, so I vote in their primary.