New Secretary

Mar 9

Kristi Noem is out and Sen. Markwayne Mullin (OK) is in as the nominee to be Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). The announcement from U.S. President Donald Trump comes on the heels of a volatile tenure for Noem as DHS Secretary and amid an ongoing shutdown of the Department as Congress grapples with how to reach a funding agreement.

Noem has been appointed as Special Envoy for the Shield of Americas (a new drug fighting program), while Mullin will need confirmation from the U.S. Senate to formally assume his new role. According to OK law, he will be replaced in the Senate by an appointee from OK Gov. Kevin Stitt, but that appointee must agree not to run for reelection.

Analysis and eternal perspective: Noem is the first cabinet member to be fired in the current administration, but it is not unusual for turnover to begin to occur in the second year of a presidential term. Noem’s time at DHS was marked with considerable upheaval—perhaps nowhere more so than the Immigrations and Customs Enforcement (ICE) operations in Minnesota. The former Secretary reportedly fell out of favor with the President during a recent Senate hearing at which she testified the President knew and approved of a $220 million ad campaign featuring the then newly installed Secretary.

While this news means a change at DHS and in the U.S. Senate, it leaves the same policy issues unresolved. It will fall to Secretary Mullin, if confirmed, to chart the way forward at the Department, and it will be up to the newly constituted U.S. Senate—with Mullin’s replacement—and the U.S. House to agree to a DHS funding package.

You, as part of The Equipped family, have heard this reminder spanning administrations: While people are policy and making a change like this one is impactful, much of this story will be breathless coverage with an aim at political advantage (in both directions). You and I should be liberated to leave that latter weight where it lies, as there is no eternal benefit in taking it up.

How is the following for a direct and candid reminder?

“Don’t have anything to do with foolish and stupid arguments, because you know they produce quarrels. And the Lord’s servant must not be quarrelsome but must be kind to everyone, able to teach, not resentful” (2 Tim. 2:23-24).

The preceding article originally appeared in Thann’s “The Equipped” Weekly Newsletter. For more information on Thann’s weekly email, click here.

Thann Bennett

Thann Bennett is the Founder and President of Every Good Work, which exists to equip Jesus followers for a life of impact. His weekly newsletter, The Equipped, helps Jesus followers engage current events through a lens of the True and the beautiful. Thann and his wife, Brooke, are co-Founders of A Fearless Life, which works to find and fund a family for every adoption-eligible foster child in America. Thann has more than two decades of high-level public policy experience, with a particular focus on the U.S. Congress and the United Nations. He is the author of In Search of the King and My Fame His Fame. Thann and Brooke live in southern Maryland with their three children: Jude, Gambrell, and Hope, as well as a host of farm animals. The Bennetts are longtime members of the National Community Church family in Washington, D.C.

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