Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell Addison (Mitch) Mitchell McConnellFEC flags McConnell campaign over suspected accounting errors Poll: 59 percent think president elected in November should name next Supreme Court justice Mark Kelly: Arizona Senate race winner should be sworn in 'promptly' MORE (R-Ky.) said Tuesday that Congress will not pass a fix for a key Obama-era immigration program this year despite demands from Democrats and outside groups.

"No, we’ll not be doing DACA this week. That’s a matter to be discussed next year. The president has given us until March to address that issue. We have plenty of time to do that," McConnell told Fox News, referring to the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program.

Congress is expected to wrap up its work for the year this week and leave town until January.

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The Trump administration announced earlier this year that it was ending DACA, setting a deadline in March for lawmakers to address the issue.

But progressive Democrats and immigration activists are demanding that lawmakers attach a fix for DACA — which allows immigrants brought into the U.S. as children to work and go to school — to a short-term government funding bill.

Congress has until the end of the day Friday to pass a government funding bill and avoid a shut down. The Senate is expected to offer a short-term bill that would punt the funding fight to January.

McConnell noted that he and Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer Chuck SchumerCruz blocks amended resolution honoring Ginsburg over language about her dying wish Senate Democrats introduce legislation to probe politicization of pandemic response Schumer interrupted during live briefing by heckler: 'Stop lying to the people' MORE (D-N.Y.) have been discussing how to keep the government open, predicting they would avoid a shut down.

Schumer sidestepped questions earlier Tuesday when asked if he would vote against a short-term funding bill if it doesn't include an immigration fix.

"I'm hopeful that we won't get to that. I'm hopeful that they'll put something — [a] bipartisan proposal with both [the] DREAM [Act] and border security in the bill," he said, saying negotiators were "coming pretty close to a conclusion" over the issue.

The Development, Relief and Education for Alien Minors (DREAM) Act would provide immigrants brought into the country illegally as children with a path to citizenship.

But Republicans, and the Trump administration, have been adamant they will not link the immigration fight to the year-end funding bill.

Senate Republicans will need to win over at least eight Democratic or independent senators to pass the funding bill, assuming they can hold their own caucus together.

Dozens of House Democrats, and several of their progressive counterparts in the Senate, have threatened to vote against a funding bill without a deal on DACA.

Senators have been locked in talks for weeks about trying to find an agreement that linked DACA to a border security fix.

But members involved with the talks have appeared skeptical they could work out a solution by the end of the year.

"I think it's unrealistic for a couple of reasons — mechanically, it may be difficult to do. We now hear that there is a very strong sentiment against putting this in the year-end bill on the House side ... and I think similarly on the Senate side," Sen. Thom Tillis Thomas (Thom) Roland TillisThe Hill's Campaign Report: GOP set to ask SCOTUS to limit mail-in voting OVERNIGHT ENERGY: EPA head questions connection of climate change to natural disasters | Pebble Mine executives eye future expansion in recorded conversations | EPA questions science linking widely used pesticide to brain damage in children Liberal super PAC launches ads targeting vulnerable GOP senators over SCOTUS fight MORE (R-N.C.) told The Hill last week.