The Senate on Monday voted to confirm Sen. Markwayne Mullin of Oklahoma as the new head of the Department of Homeland Security, after he pitched himself as a change from Kristi Noem’s leadership style.
Mullin was confirmed 54-45, with Democratic Sens. John Fetterman of Pennsylvania and Martin Heinrich of New Mexico voting along with most Republicans to confirm Mullin.
The Trump administration is hoping that the new face of the embroiled department will make inroads with Democrats amid ongoing shutdown negotiations. In his confirmation process, Mullin tried to address Democrats’ concerns over the department’s aggressive approach to immigration enforcement, attempting to strike a softer tone than his predecessor.
In his hearing, Mullin said he regretted his statements in the aftermath of the deadly shooting of Alex Pretti by immigration agents in Minnesota earlier this year, in which Mullin called Pretti a “deranged individual.” Mullin also said that with him in charge, immigration officers would largely not enter homes without a judicial warrant. He said he would get rid of a Noem policy where any spending of $100,000 or more required secretary sign-off, which delayed disaster aid, something that many senators had been asking for.
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Following the vote, Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski told NOTUS she hoped Mullin would prioritize the FEMA grants that had been delayed under Noem.
“I’d like to see him help unlock some of the funding resources that have been held up in the FEMA sector,” Murkowski said. “We’ve already talked about it, and I just had an opportunity to congratulate him and tell him that I know he’s going to put 110% of himself into this and I wished him well.”
Mullin also pledged to be more responsive than his predecessor, an issue that many lawmakers had complained about.
The new DHS secretary will step into his role at a department that has been shut down for more than a month over Democrats’ demands that more guardrails be placed on federal immigration agents.
Mullin has not been far from the negotiations — he had been working on a DHS funding deal with Rep. Josh Gottheimer of New Jersey for weeks before his appointment to lead the department, The New York Times reported on Saturday. Mullin is known for his expansive relationships, including as a close Trump ally who is friendly with several Democrats, which could help him find a path forward on negotiations surrounding the department’s aggressive use of force.
While Fetterman was an early supporter of Mullin for the role, Heinrich only announced on Sunday that he’d support Mullin. He called Mullin a friend, saying in a statement that he wants “someone who recognizes the necessity of judicial warrants, as he has. I would like a Secretary who I can call and have a constructive conversation with about my state and the unique terrain that exists in the southwest.”
“I have also seen first-hand that Markwayne is not someone who can simply be bullied into changing his views,” Heinrich said in a statement after voting to advance Mullin’s nomination in a procedural floor vote. “I look forward to having a Secretary who doesn’t take their orders from Stephen Miller.”
Sen. Rand Paul, the chair of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, was the only Republican to vote against Mullin’s confirmation. Mullin and Paul have had a tense relationship for years, which came to a head last week in a bitter back-and-forth between the two at the confirmation hearing. Mullin had previously said that he completely “understood” why Paul was attacked by a neighbor in 2017, an assault which led to Paul getting part of a lung removed and resulted in several fractured ribs.
Paul subsequently questioned Mullin over his “anger issues,” pressing him over what he called a “pattern” of approving of political violence.
“I just wonder if someone who applauds violence against their political opponents is the right person to lead an agency that has struggled to accept limits to the proper use of force,” Paul said at the hearing.
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