The worst of the worst: how Kristi Noem treated the American people ‘like dogs’

Analysis The worst of the worst: how Kristi Noem treated the American people ‘like dogs’ David Smith in Washington Many will regard the ex-secretary of homeland security, Trump’s first fired cabinet member, as the worst yet seen Kristi Noem once led a dog to a gravel pit and ended its life with the cold precision of a mafia hit. On Thursday, the homeland security secretary confronted the grim truth that she, too, was expendable. Noem became the first cabinet member fired in Donald Trump’s second term, a striking contrast to the revolving-door chaos of his first. Like other members of Team Trump , she had assumed that ostentatious displays of fealty to the president would insulate her. As the face of immigration enforcement, often putting herself in the centre of the action, she managed to turn Trump’s signature issue into a political liability. Add a disastrous appearance before Congress this week and it was enough for the president to finally resurrect his reality TV phrase : “You’re fired!” Trump told a story on Wednesday about another cabinet member, energy secretary Chris Wright, who recently made a speech in which, instead of merely mentioning “coal”, he used the phrase “clean, beautiful coal” every time in an effort to impress the president. “I said, Chris, easy!” Trump recalled to an amused audience. Noem was to immigration enforcement what Wright was to coal. She tried too hard. There was performative cosplay: sometimes the 54-year-old dressed in a flak jacket and accompanied agents on immigration raids as cameras recorded, though she does not have a law enforcement background. The former governor of South Dakota also posed in front of a group of shirtless, tattooed men behind bars during a visit to an El Salvador prison where the Trump administration sent people it accused of being gang members. On social media, she referred to immigrants convicted of crimes as “scumbags”. Meanwhile, under her leadership, there was terror as masked immigration agents surged...