Kristi Noem sparked outrage online this week after she refused to retract or apologize for publicly smearing Renée Good and Alex Pretti after they were killed by immigration officers.
A behavior, one historian explained, that was pulled from a familiar “playbook.”
Then-Homeland Security Secretary Noem faced a bipartisan grilling at a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Tuesday for, among several things, the department’s violent handling of its immigration enforcement operations.
She was also grilled by several representatives at a House Judiciary Committee hearing on Wednesday for falsely suggesting that Pretti and Good, two Minneapolis residents killed by federal immigration enforcement agents, were domestic terrorists. Noem’s description of events has been widely disputed by video footage taken from both incidents.
In the wake of the hearings, President Donald Trump announced on Thursday that he fired Noem and is tapping Sen. Markwayne Mullin (R-Okla.) to replace her, effective March 31.
