by
Nathan
Posner/Anadolu
via
Getty
Images)
Despite
building
his
whole
brand
around
saying
“you’re
fired,”
Donald
Trump
still
can’t
bring
himself
to
say
those
words
out
loud.
At
least
not
when
it
would
involve
admitting
responsibility
for
making
a
catastrophic
hire
in
the
first
place.
And
so
Homeland
Security
Secretary
Kristi
Noem
isn’t
getting
“fired”
as
much
as
having
her
job
taken
from
her
and
being
exiled
—
at
taxpayer
expense,
no
doubt!
—
to
“Envoy
for
The
Shield
of
the
Americas.”
Which
is
the
sort
of
super
important
job
you
assign
a
toddler
to
get
them
out
of
the
kitchen.
At
least
Donald
Trump
afforded
Noem
the
dignity
of
leaving
the
job
on
her
own
terms.
Fabulous!
Noem’s
tenure
at
DHS
was
a
rolling
catastrophe.
Her
mismanagement
included
a
massive
expansion
of
immigration
agents
who
couldn’t
pass
the
basic
fitness
tests
of
their
predecessors,
militarized
surges
involving
thousands
of
illegal
detentions,
bottlenecking
FEMA
disaster
relief
by
requiring
personal
approval
on
expenditures,
and
serious
questions
about
the
Department’s
finances.
And
that’s
before
we
address
the
innocent
people
her
agents
killed.
But
she
did
show
off
a
number
of
new,
thematic
outfits!
And
yet,
despite
all
the
substantive
failures,
what
ultimately
spelled
the
end
of
Gestapo
Barbie
was
the
unforgivable
sin
of
being
terrible
on
television.
Trump
was
reportedly
frustrated
with
Noem’s
appearances
before
the
Senate
and
House
Judiciary
committees
this
week,
where
she
managed
the
impressive
feat
of
uniting
Democrats
and
Republicans
in
shared
contempt.
Republican
Senator
Thom
Tillis
called
her
leadership
“a
disaster”
and
compared
it
to
the
time
she
bragged
about
shooting
her
own
dog
for
being
“untrainable.”
“Those
are
bad
decisions
made
in
the
heat
of
the
moment
—
not
unlike
what
happened
up
in
Minneapolis,”
Tillis
said.
Senator
John
Kennedy,
channeling
Foghorn
Leghorn
as
always,
attacked
Noem
over
a
$220
million
ad
campaign
that
Kennedy
found
only
“effective
in
your
name
recognition.”
DHS
spent
nearly
a
quarter
of
a
billion
dollars
on
commercials
of
Noem
herself
telling
migrants
to
leave
the
country
against
the
backdrop
of
Mount
Rushmore.
In
a
curious
twist,
that
money
was
funneled
through
a
company
created
just
11
days
before
it
won
the
contract.
Normally
federal
contracts
have
more
oversight
than
this,
but
Noem
invoked
a
national
emergency
to
dispense
with
the
bidding
process.
That
company
then
subcontracted
the
work
to
a
firm
run
by
the
husband
of
Noem’s
former
chief
DHS
spokesperson.
The
firm
also
has
ties
to
Noem’s
longtime
adviser
and
alleged
romantic
partner
Corey
Lewandowski.
Subcontractors
can,
of
course,
get
around
public
disclosure
altogether.
Maybe
giving
her
a
$30
billion
slush
fund
was
a
bad
idea.
When
Kennedy
pressed
her
on
whether
Trump
had
approved
the
campaign,
Noem
said
yes.
Repeatedly.
Under
oath.
The
White
House
claims
Trump
doesn’t
know
anything
about
it.
In
Noem’s
defense,
Trump
doesn’t
seem
to
know
where
he
is
day-to-day
so
they
might
both
be
right.
Republicans
had
no
problem
last
year
when
she
went
before
Congress
and
beclowned
herself
for
not
knowing
what
habeas
corpus
meant.
But
being
a
moron
is
not
as
grave
a
transgression
as
looking
embattled
on
screen.
On
that
point
—
that
the
Republicans
don’t
care
how
stupid
an
administration
official
might
be:
Markwayne
Mullin
really
did
need
to
get
out
of
the
Senate.
Tommy
Tuberville
is
running
for
governor
of
Alabama
and
he’s
the
only
thing
standing
between
Mullin
and
the
title
of
dumbest
U.S.
Senator.
Mullin
is
a
former
MMA
fighter
who
once
tried
to
physically
fight
a
Teamsters
union
president
during
a
Senate
hearing.
Recently,
Mullin
appeared
on
CNN
and
struggled
to
explain
how
Iran
could
be
rebuilding
nuclear
facilities
that
Trump
had
supposedly
“obliterated.”
When
pressed
three
times
on
the
logical
contradiction,
Mullin
compared
it
to
rebuilding
a
house
after
a
tornado.
Which
is
a
fair
analogy
as
long
as
you
accept
that
thermonuclear
devices
are
roughly
as
complex
as
a
double
wide
trailer.
None
of
this
should
change
how
Homeland
Security
functions.
Mullin
isn’t
being
brought
in
to
cure
all
those
illegal
detentions,
he’s
being
brought
in
to
keep
his
head
mostly
down
amid
the
criticism.
And
when
it
comes
to
keeping
his
head
down,
Mullin
has
a
lot
of
experience
dating
back
to
January
6:
Williams/CQ-Roll
Call,
Inc
via
Getty
Images)
Meanwhile,
Noem
is
unceremoniously
dispensed
with
by
her
cruel
and
unforgiving
master
for
being
bad
at
her
job.
And
they
say
karma
doesn’t
have
a
sense
of
humor.
Earlier:
Kristi
Noem
Thinks
Habeas
Corpus
Is
A
Deportation
Spell
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