Trump removes Noem as DHS chief, installs GOP Sen. Markwayne Mullin

John T. Bennett, CQ-Roll Call on Mar 5, 2026

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WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump on Thursday ousted the embattled Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem from her post and said he would install Oklahoma Sen. Markwayne Mullin as its acting chief.

Amid his reported months of frustrations with Noem, Trump announced she would take on a new role.

“The current Secretary, Kristi Noem, who has served us well, and has had numerous and spectacular results (especially on the Border!), will be moving to be Special Envoy for The Shield of the Americas, our new Security Initiative in the Western Hemisphere we are announcing on Saturday in Doral, Florida,” he wrote on social media.

“I thank Kristi for her service at ‘Homeland,’” he added.

Her removal as DHS chief comes after weeks of pressure from Democratic and some Republican lawmakers following two American citizens’ deaths at the hands of federal agents in Minnesota.

Trump appeared ready to make Mullin the sprawling agency’s acting director, though a White House official wouldn’t specify when asked if that was the case, or whether Trump would be nominating Mullin for the position. During his first term, Trump said he developed an affinity for temporary department heads, saying he felt he had more control over their actions.

He dubbed the senator “a MAGA Warrior” and said he would “work tirelessly to Keep our Border Secure, Stop Migrant Crime, Murderers, and other Criminals from illegally entering our Country, End the Scourge of Illegal Drugs and, MAKE AMERICA SAFE AGAIN.”

Noem’s departure was the first major ejection of a Cabinet member during Trump’s second term. His first was marked by a steady revolving door of Cabinet officials and senior White House advisers.

The president reportedly viewed as a final straw her testimony to lawmakers this week that he personally signed off on her $200 million mass deportation program advertising campaign.

The former South Dakota House member and governor began her DHS stint as a superstar in Trump’s eye. But her rocky tenure came under renewed scrutiny after federal immigration enforcement personnel from agencies under her authority shot and killed two American citizens who pushed back on their tactics implementing Trump’s mass deportation program.

Amid reports of the president’s frustrations with how Noem and other senior administration officials responded to federal agents in Minneapolis wrestling 37-year-old nurse and protester Alex Pretti to the ground and shooting him dead, Trump earlier this year was asked if his DHS secretary should resign. “No,” he responded.

That changed Thursday as the president concluded she was hindering his second term.

After an uproar set off by Pretti’s death, Trump deployed border czar Tom Homan to take over mass deportation efforts there, sidelining Gregory Bovino, Customs and Border Protection’s commander-at-large. During a recent campaign trip to Iowa, Trump dubbed Bovino as “very good,” while also describing him as “a pretty out there kind of a guy.”

“And in some cases, that’s good. Maybe it wasn’t good here,” Trump said of Bovino’s role in Minneapolis, where video showed him tossing tear gas and verbally clashing with peaceful protesters — and even motorists pulled over by his troops, who Trump also ordered to leave Minneapolis.

In the aftermath of Pretti’s death, many congressional Democrats called for Noem’s ouster — echoed by at least two Republican senators: Thom Tillis, the retiring North Carolinian, and Alaska’s Lisa Murkowski, a moderate who at times has been a thorn in Trump’s side.

“I think that what she’s done in Minnesota should be disqualifying, she should be out of a job,” Tillis said recently of Noem. “I mean really, it’s just amateurish, it’s terrible, it’s making the president look bad on policies that he won on ... they’ve got to de-escalate and treat these communities with some respect.”

Murkowski, in a recent interview, said “the president needs to look at who he has in place as a secretary of Homeland Security,” adding: “I would not support her again, and I think it probably was time for her to step down.”

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(Valerie Yurk and Savannah Behrmann contributed to this report.)