Department of Homeland Security (DHS) staff say Kristi Noem sealed her own fate with a humiliating performance in two congressional hearings just before the president finally decided to get rid of her.
Her firing came in the form of a Truth Social blast from President Trump, who said Thursday that she had “served us well” before announcing she will be moved into a seemingly made-up position as “Special Envoy for the Shield of the Americas.”
“It was only a matter of time,” one DHS insider told the Daily Beast of her ouster.
The axe fell on the 54-year-old Homeland Security secretary almost immediately after her humiliating performance on Capitol Hill. Noem testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday and the House Judiciary Committee on Wednesday. They were her first congressional appearances since federal agents under her command killed two U.S. citizens, Renee Nicole Good and Alex Pretti, both 37, during Operation Metro Surge in Minneapolis in January.
Already facing backlash for Good’s killing when Pretti was shot dead just a few days later, Noem sparked outrage by falsely describing Pretti as a domestic terrorist—and then privately trying to pin the blame for the fiasco on White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller.
“She was blaming Miller for a lot. No way Trump lets her stay after that,” the DHS insider said.
Noem’s rumored affair with her top adviser, Corey Lewandowski, also appeared to become a thorn in Trump’s side in recent weeks as reports snowballed about the two traveling together aboard a luxury jet with its own private bedroom.
One DHS insider who was not at all surprised by Noem’s firing quipped, “Just wondering what Corey will get up to in his last 20-odd days.”
Noem is due to hand over the reins to MAGA Sen. Markwayne Mullin on March 31.
For those inside her agency, her final service to them has been a massive letdown. The congressional hearings where she testified earlier this week were seen as an opportunity to break the deadlock over a partial DHS shutdown that has now dragged into its third week, leaving tens of thousands of agency workers on the job but off the payroll.
Multiple insiders told the Daily Beast that Noem came nowhere close to delivering on that front.
While several sources said they had “enjoyed” seeing Noem get a “hammering,” and that she had been “slaughtered,” a despondent departmental staffer told the Daily Beast: “I really don’t think she got us anywhere closer to being paid.”
More than 90 percent of the agency’s workforce is currently working without pay, the second time in six months that they have been caught in a funding standoff.
The shutdown has been running since Feb. 13, when Senate Democrats blocked a Republican bill to restore DHS appropriations through September, demanding binding reforms to ICE and Customs and Border Protection (CBP).
They include mandatory body cameras, a ban on face masks, requiring agents to obtain court-issued warrants before entering homes or private premises, and enforceable use-of-force standards—which take on heightened importance in the wake of Good and Pretti’s deaths.
On Noem’s performance under questioning during the congressional hearings, the verdict inside the department was equally bleak. “Some GOPers were literally guiding her by the nose, and she still failed,” one source said.
Another found grim satisfaction in seeing Louisiana Sen. John Kennedy, 74, methodically “crushing” the Homeland Security secretary.
Punchbowl News reported that Trump had been reaching out to Republican senators in the immediate aftermath of Tuesday’s hearing to take stock of whether he should remove her—a temperature-check that underlined how badly the sessions had landed at the White House.
The outlet also reported that House Speaker Mike Johnson, 54, had raised the possibility of replacing Noem at a House Republican leadership retreat in January.
Kennedy’s grilling on Tuesday was certainly pointed. As the Beast reported, the Louisiana senator skewered Noem over the $220 million DHS ad campaign that prominently featured her, telling her that the spending had been effective, but only in boosting “your name recognition.”
North Carolina’s Thom Tillis, 65—who is not seeking re-election—was more scathing. In a stinging 10-minute rebuke, the exit-bound senator declared: “What we’ve seen is a disaster under your leadership”—and called for her resignation, to audible applause.
Wednesday’s House Judiciary session brought fresh humiliation. Democratic Rep. Sydney Kamlager-Dove used her allotted time to ask Noem point-blank whether she had ever had a sexual relationship with Lewandowski, 52.
In doing so, she entered a string of media headlines about the pair into the congressional record, among them a Beast report about Lewandowski being spotted at Noem’s Washington apartment building.
Noem called the inquiry “tabloid garbage” and declined to answer directly.
Some Republicans have reportedly tried to short-circuit the funding impasse by other means. The Bulwark reported that there is chatter among some in the GOP about offering Democrats Noem’s removal in exchange for votes to reopen the agency.
But Democrats the outlet spoke to dismissed the idea outright. Their position, the Bulwark noted, is that the problems at DHS are systemic—and that swapping out the secretary while leaving ICE’s structure intact would amount to winning a scalp while conceding nothing of substance.
The Daily Beast has contacted the White House and the Department of Homeland Security for comment.
A DHS spokesperson said the “accusations are garbage,” which were “peddled” by Democrats “to distract from their failed open border and sanctuary policies that made America less safe.”
In a statement sent just a few hours before Noem got the boot, the spokesperson said: “Secretary Noem serves at the pleasure of the President. She is honored to serve the American people and lead DHS.”
