Okayristi Identify performed “Scorching Mama” because the walk-up music for her formal introduction on the Division of Homeland Safety headquarters in January 2025. President Trump had put her in control of his signature marketing campaign promise—the biggest mass-deportation marketing campaign in U.S. historical past—and Noem took a quick, flashy method to the job. She dressed as a Border Patrol agent and an ICE officer, and rode horseback at Mount Rushmore in adverts. She flew to El Salvador and posed in entrance of a jail cell filled with tattooed inmates. She made no apologies for aggressive enforcement ways on American streets, even those who seemingly broke the legislation, or for the deaths of two U.S. residents who opposed her method.
However it wasn’t the killings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti in Minneapolis earlier this yr that lastly price Noem her job right this moment, making her the primary ousted Cupboard secretary of Trump’s second time period. As a substitute, it was her self-promotion.
Noem’s standing was already shaky when she went to Capitol Hill to testify this week. On Tuesday, Senator John Kennedy of Louisiana, a Republican, requested whether or not Trump himself had authorized Noem’s $220 million advert marketing campaign that featured her urging migrants to self-deport. Noem mentioned sure, and defended the adverts as “efficient.”
The adverts “have been efficient in your identify recognition,” Kennedy informed Noem, saying that she put Trump “in a really awkward spot.” He was implying the fee of a cardinal sin for a Trump Cupboard member: in search of to outshine the president. Kennedy informed reporters right this moment that he had spoken with Trump. “Her model of the reality and the president’s model of the reality are decidedly completely different,” Kennedy mentioned.
Noem had been saying for greater than a yr that the thought for the adverts got here from Trump himself. However with public opinion souring on Trump’s mass deportations, the messaging marketing campaign that Noem touted as successful—and the no-bid contracts behind it—had come beneath suspicion from lawmakers. An individual conversant in the choice to fireplace Noem informed us that the president was upset about her try to cross the blame for the advert marketing campaign onto him, and for her equivocation on the questions on her alleged romantic relationship with Corey Lewandowski, who has been working at DHS as her de facto chief of employees.
“Changing Kristi was primarily based on the end result of her many unlucky management failures together with the fallout in Minnesota, the advert marketing campaign, the allegations of infidelity, the mismanagement of her employees, and her fixed feuding with the heads of different businesses, together with CBP and ICE,” one administration official who requested anonymity texted us. “Kristi’s drama sadly overshadowed and distracted from the Administration’s extraordinarily widespread immigration agenda, which is able to proceed full pressure.”
The White Home declined to remark.
Some Republicans had urged the president to not do away with Noem till subsequent month, after the submitting deadline for candidates in her residence state of South Dakota. Allies of Senate Majority Chief John Thune and members of Trump’s political crew have been fearful that Noem would collect the mandatory signatures to announce a marketing campaign for the U.S. Senate or the U.S. Home later this yr—and thus create a messy major contest.
Trump clearly couldn’t wait that lengthy, however he added a provision halfway by means of the Fact Social publish saying Noem’s departure: Her transition out of the workplace would happen on March 31, 2026—the identical day because the submitting deadline. Trump mentioned Noem will then serve in a newly created special-envoy position for a White Home initiative known as the “Protect of the Americas,” and promised to offer extra particulars at an occasion in Doral, Florida, on Saturday.
Noem has been preventing to maintain her job ever since federal officers shot and killed Pretti on January 24. Abruptly there have been requires Noem to be faraway from workplace not simply amongst Democrats however amongst some Republicans. Trump eliminated her from overseeing deportation efforts in Minnesota and despatched Tom Homan, his “border czar,” to take over DHS operations there and clear up the mess. Homan and Noem are political rivals.
White Home advisers have been upset that Noem, 9 days after the taking pictures, introduced that each one federal brokers in Minneapolis would start carrying physique cameras and that the coverage would develop throughout the nation as funding turned obtainable. This was a central demand of Democrats, who have been then threatening to not fund DHS, however Noem had not tied the concession to the continued negotiations. Later, White Home aides grew involved when Noem’s crew signaled that it might be receptive to a unbroken decision to fund her division, although the White Home needed a brand new invoice. (On the time, an aide to Noem denied that the secretary supported persevering with funding for the division at beforehand set ranges.)
One Trump adviser mused to us that the sustained Democratic assaults on Noem have been truly one of many few issues serving to her keep in her job, as a result of the president didn’t wish to reward his political enemies along with her dismissal.
One other nagging subject for the White Home was Noem’s private {and professional} relationship with Lewandowski, her alleged paramour. After the 2024 election, Lewandowski had angled to change into Noem’s chief of employees, solely to face pushback from the president, who fearful concerning the experiences of their romantic involvement. (Each have denied any improper relationship.) He joined the division as an alternative as a particular authorities worker.
The association didn’t stop rumors from spreading, nevertheless, and changing into a significant distraction for the division. Noem’s acquisition of recent DHS plane—and use of a luxurious jet with a bed room—introduced extra scrutiny to their relationship. In the course of the hearings this week, Democratic lawmakers tried to pressure Noem to disclaim beneath oath any sexual relationship with Lewandowski. She refused to reply instantly, dismissing the questions as “tabloid rubbish.” Seated behind Noem was her husband.
Lewandowski is predicted to go away DHS with Noem on the finish of the month, in response to a senior division official who was not licensed to debate the transition. Noem’s spokesperson, Tricia McLaughlin, left final month amid bipartisan criticism of DHS’s resolution to accuse Good and Pretti of “home terrorism.”
On the identical day that Trump took away Noem’s authority in Minnesota, the secretary spent greater than an hour within the Oval Workplace with the president, hoping to win again his favor. One focus of that assembly was Noem’s continued frustrations with the tempo of the border wall’s development, which she blamed on Customs and Border Safety Commissioner Rodney Scott. The transfer appeared to purchase her a while, and within the week that adopted, Trump privately and publicly praised her management of DHS.
Noem had lengthy described her relationship with the president as a detailed one. She informed the viewers at a Conservative Political Motion Committee dinner in February 2025 that it was Trump’s concept to have her play the lead position in an advert blitz that the division had launched earlier that month. “We had a number of conferences through the transition, speaking about it,” Noem mentioned. She had beforehand appeared in adverts for the group FreedomWorks that had impressed the president, Noem informed the viewers.
“These lovely adverts you probably did about South Dakota,” Noem mentioned Trump informed her. “They’d Mount Rushmore. I need you to do these for the border.” Based on Noem, Trump directed her to launch a “advertising marketing campaign” that might “be certain the American folks know the reality of what you’re doing.”
Trump informed Noem he didn’t wish to seem within the adverts. “He mentioned: Nope, nope. I need you within the adverts. And I need your face within the adverts,” Noem informed the viewers, including that Trump instructed her concerning the first advert: “I need you to thank me. I need you to thank me for closing the border.”
“They are going to run all through the world,” Noem mentioned Trump informed her, “letting America and the world comprehend it has a brand new chief.” On Thursday, Trump informed Reuters that he had nothing to do with the advert marketing campaign: “I by no means knew something about it.”
It’s unclear how Trump’s succession plan at DHS will play out over the following few weeks. The president, in a Fact Social publish right this moment, mentioned he would set up Senator Markwayne Mullin of Oklahoma as the brand new secretary, however Mullin must be confirmed by his friends. The deputy-secretary place at DHS is vacant, and the official subsequent in line to take over as performing secretary is Rob Regulation, the undersecretary for technique, coverage, and plans. However DHS may change its order of succession to put in a special official.
Mullin mustn’t have bother profitable a majority vote; Senate Republicans rapidly issued statements supporting his nomination, as did not less than one Democrat, Senator John Fetterman of Pennsylvania. Though the bipartisan need to see Noem depart could possibly be an incentive to substantiate Mullin rapidly, his nomination listening to will give Democrats a chance to press him to publicly decide to a few of the modifications to ICE operations that they’re in search of as a part of negotiations over DHS funding.
By selecting Mullin, Trump can be taking considered one of his high congressional loyalists out of the Senate. Mullin performed a outstanding position in shepherding a number of of the president’s Cupboard picks to affirmation initially of his second time period. Whether or not Mullin’s successor within the Senate will again the president as staunchly is unclear: Oklahoma Governor Kevin Stitt, a Republican whom Trump derided final month as a “RINO,” or “Republican in identify solely,” will appoint a alternative to serve till a particular election is held. Beneath Oklahoma legislation, the interim senator can’t be a candidate in that race.
Noem thanked the president for appointing her to the brand new place and, in a press release, rattled by means of her achievements throughout her 13-month stint. “We now have made historic accomplishments on the Division of Homeland Safety to make America protected once more,” she mentioned.
Inside the division, Noem’s ouster was celebrated by some who considered her as a self-promoter who ran the division erratically. One official put it this method to us: “Plenty of glad folks right here right this moment.”
