Politics and views in the United States

Kristi Noem is fired from her position as Homeland Security Secretary, but moves to a new and unclear role. The Senate Majority Leader blames Democrats for the ongoing DHS shutdown and the House fails to advance a war powers resolution for Iran.

TRANSCRIPT

Welcome to 2026 Talks, where we're following our democracy in historic times.

We're going to have to secure our border and make sure we're going after dangerous criminal illegals and remove them from our country.

And every day we're going to have to make tough decisions to uphold the law, to make sure the consequences for breaking the law are put in place as well.

After a harsh grilling in the Senate, Christine Noem has been fired as Homeland Security Secretary.

She led President Donald Trump's mass deportation effort but was criticized when agents killed two Minnesota protesters, whom she falsely called domestic terrorists.

Senators also accused her of mismanagement, delaying emergency relief contracts while spending extravagantly, including $200 million for ads telling people without legal status to leave the country voluntarily.

Trump tapped Oklahoma Republican Senator Markwayne Mullen to replace her.

Noem is moving to an as-yet-undefined role as special envoy to a new effort called "The shield of the Americas.

Congress is no closer to funding her old department.

Since the Minneapolis shootings, Democrats have demanded reforms, notably a uniform code of conduct for federal agents requiring body cameras but forbidding masks.

Senate Majority Leader John Thune calls it a political ploy.

"If Democrats really wanted to put reforms in place, they'd be doing everything they can to get a bill.

Of course, the White House isn't going to sign off on every Democrat demand.

No side gets everything it wants in negotiations."

House Democrats have introduced a bill to fund all DHS agencies with the exception of ICE and CBP.

Connecticut Democratic Representative Rosa DeLauro says the Speaker is preventing it from getting a vote, instead favoring the agency's "lawlessness."

DeLauro and other Democrats say the Republicans would rather have immigration as an issue than work to fix it.

She points to a bipartisan border security compromise reached at the end of the Biden administration which died when Thune and almost all Republicans voted against it at the request of then-candidate Trump.

North Carolina's Senate race is already heating up as Democratic former Governor Roy Cooper prepares to face former Republican National Committee Chairman Michael Watley.

Both of the state's current senators are Republicans, but Kirk Badoe with Insider Politics website The Hotline says Democrats like their chances in the battleground.

"Governor Roy Cooper has never lost a statewide election.

He has all that money on hand.

He left relatively very popular in North Carolina, too, which is saying something in a 50-50 state like that."

The House and the Senate have now failed to pass war powers resolutions that would limit Trump's authority to attack Iran.

A handful of Republicans did support the House version, including isolationist Republican Kentucky Representative Thomas Massey.

Why are we going to war with Iran?

We owe our military service members a clear mission.

And American families in my district want to know how this is going to help them pay for groceries.

Iran is continuing its own attacks on more than a dozen countries, including most of the Gulf region.

I’m Edwin J. Viera for Pacifica News Network and Public News Service.

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