The Department of Homeland Security under President Joe Biden descended into a bungling, nontransparent bureaucracy that welcomed illegal immigration and weaponized its resources against American citizens, said Republicans in the U.S. Senate.
They said Republican South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem, President-elect Donald Trump’s choice to lead the department, will put a halt to those perceived abuses by securing the southern border and fulfilling the rest of the department’s wide-ranging mission while protecting civil liberties.
Sen. Bernie Moreno, R-Ohio, said Noem can’t take over the agency soon enough.
“We cannot wait one single day without you being in charge of that department,” Moreno told Noem on Friday at her confirmation hearing held by the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee.
Votes on her nomination by the panel and full Senate were not immediately scheduled, but her confirmation is not in doubt.
Moreno called current DHS head Alejandro Mayorkas “the worst Cabinet member in the history of the United States of America,” a verdict echoed by Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Missouri, and others.
They said fentanyl trafficking and violent crimes by illegal immigrants have gone almost unchecked by the DHS, the department that includes Customs and Border Protection as well as Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Those senators also complained of hotel accommodations for illegal immigrants and what they called abuses of an app for asylum seekers.
‘No. 1 Priority’
Securing the southern border is Trump’s “No. 1 priority,” said Noem, who pledged to carry that out in the course of overseeing the sprawling department that also includes the Secret Service, the Transportation Security Administration, the Coast Guard and the Federal Emergency Management Agency, among other units.
“Absolute toughness” is how Sen. John Thune of South Dakota, leader of the Republican-controlled Senate, described Noem in his introduction.
Thune also applauded Noem’s leadership for making South Dakota welcome for people escaping "heavy-handed" COVID-19 restrictions.
“Our state stayed open, stayed free,” Thune said.
Thune does not serve on the Homeland Security Committee, which is also devoid of Wyoming’s senators and those of any states bordering Wyoming.
Sen. Rand Paul, R-Kentucky, the committee chairman, said DHS’s cybersecurity arm under Biden violated Americans’ free-speech rights by trying to persuade tech platforms to censor information about COVID-19 that challenged the official narrative.
Noem pledged to end such politicization, saying she instead would use the cybersecurity division to better combat cyberattacks by China and others.
Secret Service Needs A ‘Housecleaning’
Other senators chided FEMA staff for skipping over homes with Trump signs in their yards as the agency’s personnel worked to help people in the aftermath of the hurricane that ravaged eastern North Carolina and elsewhere.
Hawley and others ripped Mayorkas for stonewalling them on questions about border security and Secret Service protection of Donald Trump.
Even a Democrat on the panel, Sen. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut, said the Secret Service needs a “housecleaning, top to bottom.”
Noem agreed the agency needs reforms in the wake of near-assassinations against Trump on the campaign trail last year.
Democrats on the committee greeted Noem courteously, though none pledged to vote for her.
"While we must address the significant challenges we face on the southern border, we also need to ensure there are sufficient resources to secure our northern border," said Sen. Gary Peters, the panel's top Democrat, whose state of Michigan includes "two of the nation's busiest" U.S. entry points at the Canada line.
Sen. Maggie Hassan, D-New Hampshire, agreed.
"We have recently, in New Hampshire, seen a dramatic increase in unauthorized border crossings at the northern border," she said.
Hassan said resources are severely strained at the U.S.-Canada border and that she is working on bipartisan legislation to change that.
DHS, whose duties overlap with the Department of Justice's in many respects, was created in a major restructuring of the U.S. government in the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks.
Senators gave slightly different statistics on the department Friday, but agreed its personnel runs in the neighborhood of 250,000 and its annual budget tops $100 billion.
