President-elect Donald Trump will select Republican South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem to lead the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).
Noem will be tapped to replace outgoing DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, the Trump transition team confirmed Tuesday evening. Both Trump and Noem issued statements via a post on X celebrating the news.
“Kristi has been very strong on Border Security,” Trump stated. “I have known Kristi for years, and have worked with her on a wide variety of projects – She will be a great part of our mission to Make America Safe Again.”
The governor’s appointment to lead DHS — a massive department of hundreds of thousands of employees that make up Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and other agencies — position her as a pivotal member of Trump’s upcoming immigration agenda. The president-elect has pledged to embark on ambitious border security goals that include a massive deportation program and other crackdowns on illegal immigration.
Noem will join what is already shaping up to be a hardline immigration team, with Trump tapping former ICE acting director Tom Homan to serve as “border czar” and Stephen Miller to serve as his deputy chief of staff for policy. Both men previously worked in the first Trump administration and are widely regarded as immigration enforcement hawks.
Unlike Homan or Miller, Noem will require Senate confirmation to serve her role in an official capacity. However, with the Republican Party having secured a 53-seat majority in the Senate, her nomination will likely succeed.
Trump, who already established himself as a stalwart on border enforcement during his first term in office, has declared he will complete the U.S.-Mexico border wall, revive the Remain in Mexico program, bring back the travel ban and hire more Border Patrol agents. The president-elect also introduced a number of more novel pledges while on the campaign trail, such as a vow to conduct the “largest deportation program in American history” and a plan to end birthright citizenship for those born on American soil by illegal migrant parents.
Noem has also positioned herself as a hawk on border policy. While serving in Congress, she supported then-President Trump’s travel ban on refugees from countries with a history of terrorism, as governor she declared she would not accept refugees into South Dakota while the Biden-Harris administration dealt with the massive border crisis and she personally offered to provide Texas GOP Gov. Greg Abbott razor wire to help him with his border security efforts.
Editor’s note: This article has been update to include confirmation from the Trump transition team.
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