Kristi Noem is just the first to fall

Yesterday, at 1:30 in the afternoon, from inside the White House, behind closed doors and away from the press, the President of the United States picked up the phone and gave an interview with a reporter from Time magazine. Donald Trump was brazen, defiant, and unbothered. And in the middle of all of it, he told us exactly how much he cares about American lives. Or, more accurately, how little. “Like I said, some people will die. When you go to war, some people will die.” He didn’t pause to clarify. He didn’t soften it. He just kept going, because he meant what he said.

When asked whether it’s reasonable for Americans to be concerned about being attacked at home in retaliation for the war he started in Iran, Trump replied, “I guess. But I think they’re worried about that all the time. We think about it all the time. We plan for it. But yeah, you know, we expect some things.”

That is the sitting President of the United States, in a cover story published today in Time magazine and titled Trump’s War, telling correspondent Eric Cortellessa, and every single one of us, that he doesn’t really care. Because this war, the one he launched to distract from mounting scandals, the one driven by ego, the one designed to consolidate power and hold onto office, is worth it to him. Even if Americans die.

And the truth is, it doesn’t even seem to be his top concern anymore. Not because the danger has passed, but because he already seems to have grown bored. And also because his cabinet is collapsing from the inside out.

Because this morning, at approximately 11 a.m., and just moments before walking on stage to deliver a keynote address in Nashville, Kristi Noem, the Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, learned that she had been fired.

By all accounts, she found out the same way the rest of us did: from a Truth Social post. Trump wrote that he was “pleased to announce” Senator Markwayne Mullin of Oklahoma would be replacing her, effective March 31. He said Noem “has served us well” and would be “moving to be Special Envoy for the Shield of the Americas, our new security initiative in the Western Hemisphere.” A title no one had ever heard before, because it didn’t exist until he needed to make her firing sound like a promotion instead of the humiliation it clearly was.

And soon after that was posted, she walked out onto the stage and gave her speech anyway. She didn’t address it or acknowledge it. But you could see it on her face. She looked like a woman who had just been told the ground beneath her had disappeared. Because it had. She was about to lose the power she had been wielding to reign terror across the country and over her fellow Americans.

This is the first Cabinet secretary Trump has fired in his second term. And that fact alone tells you everything you need to know about how serious this moment is. Because up until today, the one thing that has been different about the people surrounding him this term, compared to his first term, is that he kept every cabinet member, no matter how dangerous or irresponsible they were. Even Pete Hegseth survived Signalgate, where he violated security protocols and put U.S. troops at risk by sharing sensitive, real-time strike details. He didn’t keep these department heads because they are doing a good job. Because the second someone leaves his inner circle, they become a liability. They know too much. They’ve seen too much. They have nothing left to lose. That’s why he kept her as long as he did. That’s why he’s kept all of them.

But this time, the pressure was too much. The final straw came the week when she appeared before Congress. Over two days, she was grilled about the $220 million taxpayer-funded ad campaign that mostly featured her riding horses in front of Mount Rushmore, threatening immigrants, and slick action-movie-style propaganda videos. The contract went to a media company affiliated with a former political director of the National Republican Congressional Committee, registered to a political operative in Virginia, and incorporated just eight days before the contract was awarded, with no competitive bidding. When Representative Joe Neguse questioned her about it during the House hearing, she had no real answer. And when Republican Senator John Kennedy of Louisiana pressed her on who approved the campaign, she said Trump did. The White House immediately denied it. A White House official told NBC News, “POTUS did not sign off on a $220 million dollar ad campaign. Absolutely not.” Trump himself told Reuters, “I never knew anything about it.” And Senator Kennedy reportedly told colleagues afterward that Trump was “mad as a murder hornet.”

That was the moment. Not the two American citizens killed by her agents in Minneapolis. Not the allegations of an inappropriate relationship with her top adviser, Corey Lewandowski, who was also removed today. Not the fact that when asked at the House hearing whether she had ever had sexual relations with Lewandowski, while her husband looked on, she refused to answer, calling it “tabloid garbage.” Not her labeling Alex Pretti and Renee Good “domestic terrorists” before any investigation had begun. And not even the nearly 190 co-sponsors supporting her impeachment.

It was the money. And the embarrassment. That is why Trump let her go. Because that’s what gets you fired in this administration. Not cruelty. Not incompetence. Not the deaths of American citizens. Embarrassing the president. Making him look like he’s not in control. That is the only line that matters.

And then there is what this firing really tells us, because it’s both good news and a warning. The good news is that Trump didn’t want this to happen. He didn’t plan for it. He was so cornered, so pushed by his own party, that he had to act. Senator Kennedy was furious. Senator Tillis called her tenure “a disaster” and threatened to block all of Trump’s nominations until she answered his questions. Even Republicans who have justified every other cruelty of this administration were fed up, because she is one of the main reasons they are going to lose the midterms, and they know it. They pushed, and for the first time, Trump buckled. The pressure worked. That matters.

The warning is that whoever comes next could be worse. And in this case, he is. Markwayne Mullin is a first-term senator from Oklahoma. A former MMA fighter and plumber. He holds an associate’s degree in construction technology. He is not qualified for this position in the least. And from what we’re hearing, they were desperate because no one else wanted the job.

But his lack of qualifications isn’t what concerns me most. It’s his beliefs. And his record. Mullin endorsed the lie that the 2020 election was stolen from Donald Trump. He joined a case before the Supreme Court calling for votes in Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin to be thrown out. He was one of the candidates who ran on the Big Lie during his 2022 special election. And now he’s being asked to oversee the security of our elections and our borders.

And this is the same man who, during a Senate hearing in 2023, stood up from his chair and nearly got into a physical fight with Teamsters president Sean O’Brien. He adjusted his wedding ring like he was about to take it off for a bare-knuckle brawl. Senator Bernie Sanders had to bang his gavel and shout, “You’re a United States senator. Sit down!” This is who Trump thinks should run the largest law enforcement agency in the federal government. Not someone with restraint or clear judgment. A loyalist who will never ask questions. Who will just do what he’s told. That is the only qualification that matters anymore.

Congress is also acting more like loyalists than the independent branch of government they were meant to be. The House voted 212 to 219 to reject a war powers resolution that would have required Trump to get congressional approval before continuing military operations in Iran. Yesterday, the Senate voted 47 to 53 to kill the same measure. It was largely along party lines, with just two House Republicans, Thomas Massie of Kentucky and Warren Davidson of Ohio, voting with Democrats. In the Senate, only Rand Paul crossed the aisle. Out of every single Republican in Congress, three people had the courage to say that the Constitution still matters. This is a complete abandonment of the jobs they were elected to do. The Founders didn’t leave it ambiguous. Congress decides when this country goes to war. That power was placed in the legislative branch for exactly this reason: to prevent one man from dragging a nation into conflict on a whim. And every single Republican who voted no just handed that power to a president who told Time magazine today that “some people will die.”

And then there’s the “family values” that the Republicans all hang their hat on. Representative Tony Gonzales of Texas finally admitted to having an affair with a former staffer, Regina Santos-Aviles. She was his regional district director in Uvalde. In May of 2024, text messages show Gonzales pressuring her to send him explicit photos. She pushed back, writing, “This is too far.” He persisted. She was his subordinate. She was in a position where saying no could cost her her career, her income, and the stability her family depended on.

In September of 2025, Regina Santos-Aviles doused herself in gasoline and set herself on fire outside her home in Uvalde. After a 911 call was made, officers who responded could hear her screaming, ‘I don’t want to die.’ She died the next day. She was 35 years old. She left behind an 8-year-old son. Gonzales denied the affair for months. He called it a “coordinated political attack.” He accused her husband of blackmail. And then this week, he went on a conservative radio show and finally admitted it, saying, “I made a mistake.”

The House Ethics Committee has opened an investigation. Several Republicans, including Lauren Boebert, Nancy Mace, and Thomas Massie, have called for his resignation. House Republican leaders are urging him to drop out of his race. But Speaker Mike Johnson has not called for him to resign. And Trump, who endorsed Gonzales, has said nothing. And it’s not just that he needs to end his re-election bid. He needs to be held accountable. A woman who reported directly to him was put in a position where she believed her only way out was to set herself on fire.

And while we’re on the subject of who this party protects: today, Andrew Paul Johnson, a man Trump pardoned for his role in the January 6th Capitol riot, was sentenced to life in prison in Florida for molesting two children. He was one of over 1,500 people Trump pardoned on his first day back in office. After his pardon freed him, Johnson sexually abused two middle school-aged children. He told one of the victims he expected to receive millions of dollars from the Trump administration as restitution for being a January 6th defendant, and that he would put the child in his will to inherit the leftover money. That was how he kept them quiet. One of the children testified, “We were scared. We didn’t realize this stuff was not okay because we were 12 years old.”

This is who Donald Trump pardoned. A man who stormed the Capitol and then went home and preyed on children. Who used the promise of a Trump payout to buy their silence. And he’s not the only one. Several pardoned January 6th rioters have been charged with new crimes since Trump’s mass clemency. When Trump was asked whether these cases undermined his tough-on-crime image, he said, “No, you have thousands of people that we’re dealing with, and, you know, if one goes haywire.” If one goes haywire. That’s what he said about a child predator he set free.

This is the Republican Party heading into the midterms. A president who doesn’t care if Americans die. A fired Cabinet secretary being shuffled into a made-up diplomatic title. A Congress that just voted to give one man the unilateral power to wage war. A sitting congressman whose subordinate set herself on fire. And pardoned insurrectionists molesting children. This is not a party in power. This is a party in moral collapse. And voters are watching.

Living in the United States right now is hard. We have a president who doesn’t care if we die and a Congress that won’t stop him. And it feels like we’re in the messy middle right now. Maybe you’re feeling that too. Where things aren’t moving fast enough. Where big things are happening, real breaks, but there’s still so much uncertainty.

But here’s what I need us to hold onto tonight. Trump fired someone today. For the first time in his second term, he was forced to act. He did not anticipate this happening. His plan was to never let anyone go. And he was so cornered, so pushed, that he had to. That is a crack in his armor. And it happened because Democratic members of Congress pushed hard in those hearings. They asked the questions that made Noem say the thing that got her fired. That energy, that pressure, it worked. It doesn’t undo the damage she caused. But it proves that when we push, things move.

And we have more pushing to do. Pam Bondi announced a new rule that would block state bar associations from investigating lawyers’ misconduct. We need to fight that right now. Liz Oyer, the former pardon attorney, has been sharing detailed guidance on how to submit public comments objecting to this rule. Look her up. She is all over social media, and she understands the legal dimensions of what is happening better than almost anyone. She explains exactly how we can make our voices heard on this dangerous new proposed rule. This is a quick, concrete action every one of us can take today. And if you’re not already following Liz, she’s fantastic. I highly recommend that you do.

Today had a lot of moving pieces, but for me, I’m holding on to an encounter I had earlier while running errands. I walked past a car in a parking lot, and a man got out. He was wearing an American flag shirt, and I’ll be honest, my first instinct, judging a book by its cover, was that this was a MAGA. Then I looked at his car. It was covered in bumper stickers. And right in the center was a picture of Trump, done in that iconic style from the Obama “Hope” poster. But instead of “Hope,” it said “Fascist.”

I did a double-take. And then I saw the rest. There were a handful of other stickers on his car. None of them looked old. They all looked freshly placed, but the one that really stood out to me was the one that said he didn’t sacrifice so much in the military for our country to be taken over by an authoritarian. This man was a veteran. A patriot. Not the kind who wraps himself in the flag to silence people, but the kind who served under it and refuses to watch it be stolen.

His stickers reminded me of something so many of us forget. There are more of us than there are of them. People like us are everywhere. At the grocery store, the gas station, and the school pickup line. Veterans and nurses and teachers and parents. People who are scared, angry, and tired, but still here. We outnumber them. We just don’t always see each other. Because they’ve always been louder. They wear red hats and fly flags and make sure you know exactly where they stand. But our side carries it quietly. We hold it inside. We assume we’re alone because we don’t see our people the way we see theirs. And that silence is what makes us feel outnumbered when we’re not.

That’s why moments like this morning matter. That’s why a bumper sticker in a parking lot can feel like a lifeline. Because it breaks the silence. It says, “I’m here too.” And every time one of us does that, every time we let someone else know they’re not alone in what they see and what they feel, it gets a little bigger and a little harder to ignore.

The resistance is growing. Trump knows it. Congress knows it. And Trump’s enablers know it. And maybe it’s time we all got bumper stickers for our cars so we remember too. Because that one man’s silent protest with his bumper stickers reminded me that we are not alone. And that’s why I still have hope for America. And you should, too.

I’ll see you tomorrow,
Heather

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This commentary represents my personal opinions and analysis of matters of public concern, informed by publicly available information. Any references to individuals constitute opinion and commentary protected under the First Amendment.

Picture of the day: It’s been unseasonably warm here in San Diego, so we brought out the summer ice packs for the pups. Our youngest one even made sure her favorite toy bird was cooling off, too. I am so thankful to live in a world with furry family members. Because no matter how dark the days get, their love never wavers.