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US homeland security secretary Kristi Noem is facing new pressure as funding for the agency responsible for Donald Trump’s immigration crackdown is set to lapse following a public backlash to its aggressive actions.
Congress on Friday failed to reach an agreement on a budget deal for the Department of Homeland Security, leaving the agency that includes Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Patrol without its annual funding and facing a shutdown of its essential services and workers.
But Noem and DHS are grappling with broader problems, including accusations of leadership chaos at the agency that has presided over the president’s deportation campaign. That has included a surge in agents in Minneapolis that led to the killing of two US citizens last month.
On Friday, Noem’s standing suffered a further blow after The Wall Street Journal reported that the homeland security secretary and her close aide Corey Lewandowski were under fire for their “self-promotional style” as well as the agency’s aggressive immigration enforcement.
“Resign, fired, or impeached. Kristi Noem has got to go,” Katherine Clark, a senior House Democrat from Massachusetts, wrote on X on Friday in reaction to the article.
So far, Trump has stood by Noem, the former governor of South Dakota, and not given any indication that he intends to fire her or force her to step aside. But the president did put Tom Homan, his border tsar who is considered more pragmatic on immigration enforcement, in charge of the Minnesota operation after the two killings. At an event in Arizona on “election security” on Friday, Noem was asked if she was still running the deportation campaign.
“I am still in charge of the Department of Homeland Security,” Noem told reporters.
On Friday, Trump said Democrats had “gone crazy” and “we’ll see what happens” with the talks to restore DHS funding.
“We always have to protect law enforcement,” the president added. DHS on Friday blamed Democrats for the lapse in funding.
“Politicians are risking national security and the safety and security of the American people in the name of scoring political points and preventing president Trump from carrying out his mandate of mass deportations,” said DHS spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin.
“If Homeland Security shuts down, the 260,000 men and women who defend our homeland will go without pay and will lack the mission support they need to carry out our national security mission,” she added.
But Democrats have stood firm. Martin Heinrich, senator from New Mexico, said: “I will not vote to give another dollar to ICE until they are committed to the rule of law.”
The WSJ’s revelations have put Noem further on the defensive. The article reported that she asked a Trump pollster to make an advertisement for her after the Minneapolis shootings, and that Lewandowski fired a US Coast Guard pilot because one of the secretary’s blankets was left behind on a plane. She and Lewandowski travelled routinely on a luxury jet rather than more traditional government aircraft, the WSJ reported.
Beyond those details, Noem’s belligerent approach to immigration enforcement on American streets appears to have fallen out of favour with the US public in recent months, according to polling, and Trump is trying to adapt ahead of the midterm elections.
This week, in a significant reversal by the administration, Homan announced that the surge of federal agents in Minneapolis was ending.
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