Trump Removes Kristi Noem as Homeland Security Secretary

President Donald Trump said on Thursday that he would replace embattled Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem with Markwayne Mullin, a Republican Senator from Oklahoma, following a week of contentious congressional hearings that intensified scrutiny of her leadership and the department’s handling of immigration enforcement. Trump announced the change in post on Truth Social, saying Mullin would become Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security effective March 31. Noem, he said, would instead serve as “Special Envoy for the Shield of the Americas,” a role tied to a new regional security initiative his Administration plans to unveil this weekend in Florida. The decision marks one of the most high-profile personnel changes of Trump’s second term so far and the first time he has removed a cabinet secretary since returning to office. It follows another prominent shake-up earlier this year when Trump replaced his National Security Adviser Mike Waltz after the controversy surrounding a Signal group chat leak of sensitive war planning discussions. Noem, a former governor of South Dakota, had been a central figure in carrying out the Trump Administration’s aggressive immigration agenda, one of the top issues that Trump campaigned on. As head of DHS, she oversaw agencies responsible for border security, immigration enforcement and disaster response, and became the most visible public face of the Administration’s sweeping deportation campaign and crackdown along the southern border. But her tenure was marked by mounting controversies that eroded support inside and outside the Administration. Over the past several months, DHS has faced intense scrutiny after federal agents shot and killed two U.S. citizens during immigration enforcement operations in Minneapolis earlier this year, sparking protests and calls for investigations into the agency’s tactics. Read more: How Trump’s ICE Became an Agency in Crisis The turmoil has coincided with a standoff in Congress over funding for the department. Its budget authority lapsed in mid-February, forcing a partial shutdown affecting agencies including the Transportation Security Administration, the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the Coast Guard, while Democrats have pressed the White House for changes to immigration enforcement practices as a condition for restoring full funding. Trump’s frustration with Noem escalated sharply this week after she appeared before congressional committees for oversight hearings. Lawmakers from both parties questioned her about a $220 million government advertising campaign encouraging undocumented immigrants to leave the United States voluntarily—a campaign that prominently featured Noem herself. At one point during questioning from Republican Sen. John Kennedy of Louisiana, Noem said the President had signed off on the ad campaign. The statement reportedly angered Trump, who said he had not approved the initiative. “I never knew anything about it,” Trump later said in an interview with Reuters. This is a breaking news story and will be updated.