Kristi Noem last week “earned the distinction” of being the first Cabinet member to be fired by President Trump, said Jonathan Chait in The Atlantic. It was well deserved, because Noem generated more scandals in her year as Department of Homeland Security secretary “than a normal presidency would muster in four.” She oversaw ICE’s brutal and deeply unpopular mass deportation campaign; falsely smeared two U.S. citizens shot dead by immigration agents as “domestic terrorists”; splashed taxpayer dollars on luxury jets while stalling FEMA disaster relief; and allegedly conducted an open affair with her special adviser, Corey Lewandowski. (Both are married to other people and deny any romance.)
But ultimately it wasn’t Noem’s supposed infidelity, “incompetence, or self-enrichment” that doomed her; it was “pointing the finger at the boss.” Asked in a Senate hearing last week if Trump had approved a $220 million DHS ad campaign—which starred Noem and benefited businesses close to her—she replied, “Every single bit.” Trump quickly denied the claim and gave Noem the boot. It doesn’t matter whether she was telling the truth. To implicate Trump is to violate his “most sacred principle.”
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