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US President Donald Trump announced on Thursday that Secretary for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), Kristi Noem, would be replaced. Her removal comes two days after Noem appeared in hearing the US Congress, where she was grilled by both GOP members as well as Democrats.
DHS is the third largest department in the US government and its chief responsibility for carrying out Trump’s hard-line immigration agenda.
Noem is the first Cabinet member to be removed since Trump’s second term began. Her tenure overseeing immigration enforcement tactics was widely criticized and in the last days, she was accused of allegedly misapropriating DHS funds.
In his announcement, Trump said Noem will now serve as a “Special Envoy for The Shield of the Americas,” a new security initiative that he said would focus on the Western Hemisphere.
US Senator from Oklahoma, Markwayne Mullin, is expected to become the new Secretary of Homeland Security at the end of the month.
Ad campaign controversy
The former governor of South Dakota, Noem was a staunch supporter of Trump who had described the situation at the US-Mexico southern border as a “war zone,” prior to her appointment.
As DHS Secretary, Noem had a very public-facing role, at times shaperoning agents on immigration raids as cameras recorded. Noem does not have a law enforcement background.
During a visit to the famous CECOT prison in El Salvador, where her department sent people it accused of being gang members, she posed with the shirtless inmates, in an attempt to serve as warning to undocumented immigrants in the US.
It was one of the ways in which Noem advertised the departments’ work, which Trump critics called out as self-promotion earning her the nickname “ICE Barbie.”
The reputation seems to have caught up with Noem. When a Republican senator noted that a multimillion dollar advertising campaign seemed more for self-promotion than effective enforcement, Noem said it had been approved by Trump. But Trump publicly denied her claim just days before her dismissal.
Mounting pressure to resign
Democrats had long called for Noem to resign for what they saw as harsh and inhumane handling of immigration enforcement. Noem oversaw the revoking temporary protected status from citizens of Afghanistan, Haiti, Somalia, Syria, Venezuela and several other countries, claiming that conditions in those countries were safe for people to return to.
Noem defended the ICE the shooting deaths of two protesters in Minneapolis, going as far as calling the victims “domestic terrorists.”
Edited by: Wesley Dockery
US President Donald Trump announced on Thursday that Secretary for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), Kristi Noem, would be replaced. Her removal comes two days after Noem appeared in hearing the US Congress, where she was grilled by both GOP members as well as Democrats.
DHS is the third largest department in the US government and its chief responsibility for carrying out Trump’s hard-line immigration agenda.
Noem is the first Cabinet member to be removed since Trump’s second term began. Her tenure overseeing immigration enforcement tactics was widely criticized and in the last days, she was accused of allegedly misapropriating DHS funds.
In his announcement, Trump said Noem will now serve as a “Special Envoy for The Shield of the Americas,” a new security initiative that he said would focus on the Western Hemisphere.
US Senator from Oklahoma, Markwayne Mullin, is expected to become the new Secretary of Homeland Security at the end of the month.
Ad campaign controversy
The former governor of South Dakota, Noem was a staunch supporter of Trump who had described the situation at the US-Mexico southern border as a “war zone,” prior to her appointment.
As DHS Secretary, Noem had a very public-facing role, at times shaperoning agents on immigration raids as cameras recorded. Noem does not have a law enforcement background.
During a visit to the famous CECOT prison in El Salvador, where her department sent people it accused of being gang members, she posed with the shirtless inmates, in an attempt to serve as warning to undocumented immigrants in the US.
It was one of the ways in which Noem advertised the departments’ work, which Trump critics called out as self-promotion earning her the nickname “ICE Barbie.”
The reputation seems to have caught up with Noem. When a Republican senator noted that a multimillion dollar advertising campaign seemed more for self-promotion than effective enforcement, Noem said it had been approved by Trump. But Trump publicly denied her claim just days before her dismissal.
Mounting pressure to resign
Democrats had long called for Noem to resign for what they saw as harsh and inhumane handling of immigration enforcement. Noem oversaw the revoking temporary protected status from citizens of Afghanistan, Haiti, Somalia, Syria, Venezuela and several other countries, claiming that conditions in those countries were safe for people to return to.
Noem defended the ICE the shooting deaths of two protesters in Minneapolis, going as far as calling the victims “domestic terrorists.”
Edited by: Wesley Dockery
US President Donald Trump announced on Thursday that Secretary for the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), Kristi Noem, would be replaced. Her removal comes two days after Noem appeared in hearing the US Congress, where she was grilled by both GOP members as well as Democrats.
DHS is the third largest department in the US government and its chief responsibility for carrying out Trump’s hard-line immigration agenda.
Noem is the first Cabinet member to be removed since Trump’s second term began. Her tenure overseeing immigration enforcement tactics was widely criticized and in the last days, she was accused of allegedly misapropriating DHS funds.
In his announcement, Trump said Noem will now serve as a “Special Envoy for The Shield of the Americas,” a new security initiative that he said would focus on the Western Hemisphere.
US Senator from Oklahoma, Markwayne Mullin, is expected to become the new Secretary of Homeland Security at the end of the month.
The former governor of South Dakota, Noem was a staunch supporter of Trump who had described the situation at the US-Mexico southern border as a “war zone,” prior to her appointment.
As DHS Secretary, Noem had a very public-facing role, at times shaperoning agents on immigration raids as cameras recorded. Noem does not have a law enforcement background.
During a visit to the famous CECOT prison in El Salvador, where her department sent people it accused of being gang members, she posed with the shirtless inmates, in an attempt to serve as warning to undocumented immigrants in the US.
It was one of the ways in which Noem advertised the departments’ work, which Trump critics called out as self-promotion earning her the nickname “ICE Barbie.”
The reputation seems to have caught up with Noem. When a Republican senator noted that a multimillion dollar advertising campaign seemed more for self-promotion than effective enforcement, Noem said it had been approved by Trump. But Trump publicly denied her claim just days before her dismissal.
Democrats had long called for Noem to resign for what they saw as harsh and inhumane handling of immigration enforcement. Noem oversaw the revoking temporary protected status from citizens of Afghanistan, Haiti, Somalia, Syria, Venezuela and several other countries, claiming that conditions in those countries were safe for people to return to.
Noem defended the ICE the shooting deaths of two protesters in Minneapolis, going as far as calling the victims “domestic terrorists.”
Edited by: Wesley Dockery
[analyse_source url=”https://www.dw.com/en/kristi-noem-to-be-replaced-as-dhs-secretary-trump-says/a-76237317″]