Noem Out at Home(land)
Trump appoints Senator Markwayne Mullin as Noem's replacement
Kristi Noem is the first Cabinet casualty of Trump’s second term.
Trump’s post suggests this was a “re-assignment,” almost certainly designed to get Noem out of the spotlight of running the Department of Homeland Security. Criticism should be expected (and encouraged) of all Cabinet officials, but Noem was treated especially harshly during the Minnesota “protests” — and afterward. Just this week, Noem was grilled about the agency’s extravagant spending on private jets.
Noem was elected as the first female governor of South Dakota in 2018 after spending 8 years in the U.S. House of Representatives. Noem first made national headlines during covid, when she was the only governor who (correctly) stated she didn’t even have the power to mandate lockdowns in South Dakota. This launched her into a federal career she probably wasn’t quite ready to handle.
This personnel change comes as the Department of Homeland Security is technically shut down as lawmakers wrestle over the agency’s budget. (Read: Support for deportations.) While Oklahoma Senator Markwayne Mullin will eventually need to be confirmed by the Senate, he can take over the agency while his nomination is pending. Unsurprisingly, Mullin is a proponent of Trump’s deportation agenda — only time will tell if he can defend it better than Noem did.
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If Rubio has been my happiest surprise of the second Trump term, Noem is my saddest surprise.
the real problem is the panic after 9/11. if you combine 22 agencies into a gigantic sprawling bureaucracy what should we expect? i tell you what you can expect; an unaccountable colossal blob of pencil-pushers who create mission creep for job security without a coherent mandate.