Sooner or later, advisers in President Donald Trump’s orbit all come to learn the same unwritten rule: no-one can outshine the boss.
Kristi Noem, the secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, became the latest reminder of that on Thursday when Trump announced he was removing her as the face of the administration’s crackdown on immigration.
Noem will be replaced by Oklahoma Senator Markwayne Mullin at the end of the month, Trump said in a post on Truth Social. The US Senate will have to confirm him in the post.
The president said Noem would move to a new job as special envoy for a new US security initiative in the Western hemisphere called the Shield of the Americas.
“I thank Kristi for her service at ‘Homeland,'” Trump said.
It ends Noem’s controversial tenure at the top of the department, which is tasked with carrying out the president’s sweeping immigration agenda.
Noem was one of the administration’s brightest stars when she stepped into the role last year after Trump returned to the White House. She immediately gained attention for joining immigration raids, often appearing in a bulletproof vest alongside field agents carrying out enforcement actions.
She was a vocal advocate of Trump’s deportation drive, and touted policies that effectively closed the US-Mexico border. She also took the message abroad, in one instance visiting a maximum-security prison in El Salvador that took in some migrants deported from the US.
But Noem’s unconventional approach courted controversy from the start.
Homeland Security secretaries do not typically partake in field operations. Noem’s decision to appear on the frontlines of Trump’s immigration crackdown was viewed by critics as an effort to burnish her image as the tough-talking immigration enforcer-in-chief.
She sparked a backlash by wearing a $50,000 (£37,500) Rolex during her visit to Cecot, the notorious prison in El Salvador. Noem also appeared on horseback in a DHS advertising campaign calling for undocumented immigrants to leave the US.
This led some of Noem’s critics on the left to brand her “ICE Barbie”. Democrats in Congress also blasted her for spending $220m in federal funding on an advertising blitz starring herself, and nearly $200m on two luxury jets for her official travel.
Noem defended the ad campaign in a Capitol Hill hearing earlier this week and said Trump was aware of the spending.
But Trump publicly contradicted Noem on Thursday before announcing her firing, telling Reuters he was not aware of the expensive campaign. “I never knew anything about it,” he said.
The president had an acrimonious call with Corey Lewandowski, a senior adviser to Noem, on Tuesday after her testimony to Congress, the BBC’s US news partner CBS reported. Lewandowski is also now leaving the department.
Trump is reported to have called Republicans in Congress asking if he should fire Noem, a sign he was moving towards shaking up his immigration team this week. It is perhaps telling that some immediately backed his decision on Tuesday.
South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham, for example, said “it was time for a change”.
“A change in leadership at the Department of Homeland Security was long overdue,” said congressman Dan Newhouse, of Washington state.
But Trump’s frustration with Noem had been clear for months if not longer. The administration faced a major backlash for its immigration crackdown in Minneapolis in January, after federal agents shot dead two US citizens.
Trump sent White House border tsar Tom Homan to Minneapolis to lead the response, which resulted in a decision to scale back the operation. Homan’s appointment was widely viewed as a rebuke to Noem, who might normally have been given the assignment.
Noem was also criticised for comments she made after the deaths of Renee Good and Alex Pretti in Minneapolis, particularly her claim, made without evidence, that Pretti had “committed an act of domestic terrorism” before he was shot.
The deployment of Homan to take charge in Minnesota was a clear indication that Trump was sidelining Noem after giving her the freedom to act as the administration’s immigration enforcement star.
The administration response to the killings of Good and Pretti in Minneapolis was a rare instance of Trump moderating his message on immigration – and a sign the White House was aware the hardline approach spearheaded by Noem was growing unpopular with the public.
Polls have indicated that a majority of Americans approve of some aspects of Trump’s immigration agenda, but do not support the more aggressive tactics used by immigration agents in the field. That presents an issue for Republicans heading into an election year, and Noem’s removal suggests Trump saw a need to make a change.
It is also the first major shakeup of Trump’s second-term cabinet.
In his first term, Trump replaced his national security adviser, White House chief of staff and other top officials in his first year in office, oftentimes by announcing the firing in a tweet. The turmoil in his team frequently overshadowed Trump’s policies.
By contrast, Trump has kept his cabinet largely intact in his second term, avoiding the drama that engulfed his first stint in the White House. Whether Noem’s departure means others will follow remains to be seen.
It is also an open question whether the shakeup will lead to a new direction in policy at the Department of Homeland Security.
Mullin is a conservative Trump ally, and like Noem has long been a hardline immigration voice on the right. After Pretti’s shooting Mullin said federal law enforcement officials were “patriots” facing death threats for doing their job.
“Obstructing federal law enforcement is a felony. Most Americans follow ICE instructions without thinking twice,” Mullin said in a social media post.
More recently, he has criticised Democrats over a partial government shutdown of the Department of Homeland Security. The agency has been caught in a funding battle over proposed reforms to immigration enforcement.
In a scene reminiscent of Trump’s first term, Noem was delivering a speech in the moments when Trump posted his social media message announcing her firing. She soon published a social media post of her own, thanking Trump for her new role.
Noem may be the first high-profile casualty of Trump’s second term. But she may not be the last, as her demotion shows the president remains willing and able to read the political winds and cut his losses early.
By BBC News
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