GOP Senators Suddenly Discover Kristi Noem Is a Problem

Summary

Podcast Summary: Bulwark Takes

Episode: GOP Senators Suddenly Discover Kristi Noem Is a Problem
Date: March 4, 2026
Host(s): Sam Stein (A), JVL (C), Andrew Egger (B)

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Episode Overview

This episode dissects the explosive Senate Judiciary Committee hearing focused on DHS Secretary Kristi Noem, unpacking why GOP senators—some of whom voted to confirm her—are suddenly turning on Noem amidst scandals about immigration policy, use of government money for self-promotional ads, and her infamous personal anecdotes. The hosts scrutinize not just Noem's handling of recent tragedies in Minneapolis and her refusal to accept responsibility, but also the senators' newfound outrage and lack of accountability for their own roles in her confirmation.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Republican Senators' Sudden Criticism of Noem

• Expectation vs. Reality:
  Most anticipated a typical partisan defense of the administration and attacks on Biden (00:38). Instead, Senators Thom Tillis and John Kennedy notably grilled Noem in an unusually public and aggressive way.

• Unexpected Defections:

  • Both Tillis (a "lame duck") and Kennedy, generally reliable administration allies, sharply challenged Noem—especially on the killings of Alex Preddy and Renee Goode during a Minneapolis crackdown and her handling of related communications (00:38–01:58).

"Not super surprised that he went after Noem, but very surprised by sort of the depth of the attack..." — Andrew Egger (00:48)

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2. The DHS Ad Spending Controversy and Reputation Management

• Kennedy's Line of Attack:
  Kennedy confronted Noem about $220 million in national TV ads featuring her, indirectly accusing her of self-promotion on the taxpayer dime (02:58).

"To me, it puts the President in a terribly awkward spot...It's just hard for me to believe, knowing the president as I do, that you said, Mr. President, here's some ads I've cut and I'm going to spend $220 million running them. That he would have agreed to that." — Sen. John Kennedy (as quoted by Sam Stein, 03:32)

• Lack of Apology or Accountability:
  Noem insisted proper procedures were followed but refused to express any regret or personal responsibility for the spending or its focus on her (03:57–04:18).

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3. Minneapolis Tragedy: Government Accountability and Noem’s Response

• Conflicted Statements:
  Noem danced around whether she called Alex Preddy and Renee Goode "domestic terrorists," offering evasive explanations and placing blame on her “agents.” She avoided direct apology even when confronted with the harm caused to victims' families (06:12–08:12).

• Missed Opportunity for Remorse:
  Hosts note Noem's refusal to admit mistakes or even acknowledge the pain caused—contrasted with dominance-politics culture in "Trump world," where apology equals weakness (08:24).

“She never once says, I regret doing it. Ever. No, ever.” — JVL (06:48)

"In Trump world, you can't ever...apologize. You cannot ever admit a mistake. In Trump world, that would get her fired.” — JVL (09:38)

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4. GOP Accountability, Retirements, and Theater

• Thom Tillis’ Theatrics and Contrition:
  Tillis berated Noem for leadership failures, use of her anecdote about shooting her own dog, and lack of discipline/oversight, pointing to poor decision making as a pattern, also referencing her book (12:16–13:12).

“You decided to kill that dog because you had not invested the appropriate time in training...you have the audacity to go into a book and say it's a leadership lesson about tough choices.” — Thom Tillis (12:16)

• Host Skepticism About Senators’ Sincerity:
  Hosts blast the senators for newfound outrage after voting to confirm Noem, highlighting the lack of self-reflection or accountability, especially among retiring members:

“It's the utter lack of personal responsibility for a thing they helped happen. I just can't count on that. I'm sorry.” — JVL (15:23)

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5. Confirmation Culture and Bi-Partisanship Guilt

• Democratic Votes for Noem:
  The panel notes that several Democrats also supported Noem’s confirmation, criticizing how broken the process has become and implying complicity due to lack of seriousness in Senate vetting (16:05–19:07).

“Everyone’s like, well, I can't vote against all of them because that'll look so partisan. I gotta find someone I can say yes to.” — JVL (18:06)

• Call for Consequences:
  They discuss how such votes could impact political futures and argue that accountability for past confirmation votes is essential to prevent future inattention (18:43–19:06).

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6. Cosmetic Scapegoating and Real Reform Resistance

• Scapegoating Noem:
  Hosts argue that pushing Noem out as a scapegoat risks avoiding systemic reform and might simply signal an intent to continue current DHS policies with less controversy (23:04–24:49).

“There does appear to be this effort to, to make her the scapegoat...so ICE can go back to, you know, doing its great patriotic work without any of these reforms that Democrats have demanded.” — Andrew Egger (24:13)

• Host Concerns About Remodeling Without Reform:
  JVL and Andrew worry that quietly replacing Noem without meaningful change is dangerous, as the structural problems remain:

"That is swapping out Bovino for Homan in Minneapolis while you're still doing all the same stuff. And I don't know that that actually helps." — JVL (25:04)

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7. Missed Moments and Media Hypocrisy

• Final Note on Sen. Katie Britt:
  Despite previous high-profile concern for a child involved in the Minneapolis controversy (Liam Ramos), Britt failed to question Noem about the issue, instead highlighting ICE’s pursuit of notable criminals (25:29).

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Memorable Quotes & Moments

• On Sudden Toughness:
  “Watching people who voted to confirm her...Suddenly get all chesty about...‘I had no idea.’ Go yourselves.”—JVL (03:59–04:22)

• On Evasion:
  “She said a bunch of different things. She said 15 different things...Well, look, you know, it was a chaotic situation, and I was responding to reports from the ground.” — Andrew Egger (05:52)

• Dominance Politics:
  “In Trump world, you can't ever...apologize. You cannot ever admit a mystique. In Trump world, that would get her fired.” — JVL (09:38)

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Notable Timestamps

• 00:38–01:58: GOP Senators Tillis and Kennedy turn on Noem in hearing
• 02:58–03:57: Kennedy questions Noem about 220M in DHS ads
• 06:12–08:12: Noem refuses to apologize, hosts react to evasion
• 12:16–13:12: Thom Tillis confronts Noem with "dog killing" anecdote
• 15:22–16:05: JVL on lack of senator accountability
• 18:02–19:06: Discussion of Democratic complicity in confirmations
• 20:59–21:49: Tillis on Minneapolis, officer accountability
• 23:04–25:29: Debate on scapegoating Noem vs. genuine reform

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Conclusion & Tone

The episode is sharply critical, incredulous, and at points, openly angry at both Noem’s leadership and the broader political class’s lack of accountability. The co-hosts maintain a candid, frank, and at times profane tone, reflecting frustration at the normalization of dysfunction and performative outrage rather than substantive reform or genuine responsibility.

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Transcript

[A]

Hey everybody, it's me, Sam Stein, managing editor at the Book. I'm here with JVL and Andrew Egger. And we've been watching a pretty spicy at times hearing with Kristi Noem at the Senate Judiciary Committee this morning. Spicy in that there were, there was at least one unexpected Republican who grilled the secretary very hard. And then there was a very theatrical moment with Senator Thom Tillis that I know JVL wants to marinate on involved talk of castrated goats and dog killing and all that stuff. Because before we get into that, subscribe to the feed. Really appreciate it. So Andrew, you've been watching this with me. What's your, what's like that 30,000 foot takeaway from this hearing that happened this morning?

[B]

Yeah. So we knew what we were kind of expecting to get from most Republicans, right. It was come in, talk about how bad the Biden administration was on immigration, talk about how good of a job you guys are doing. And we got plenty of that. But like you say, there were a couple of somewhat notable defections. We were not really surprised that Thom Tillis, who is lame, ducked out and has a bit of a reputation now for like letting his freak flag fly a little bit on some of these Republicans. Not super surprised that he went after Noem, but very surprised by sort of the depth of the attack and the sort of intensity of it that's not really his bag usually is getting all sort of like bulgy eyed and spittle flecked and just mad. And then even more surprising was what we saw from Senator Kennedy, who's also Republican and who is very much not like a thorn in the side of the administration on pretty much anything. Not just going after Nome, but going after her pretty aggressively for a lot of the same reasons. You know, people like us have been criticizing her leadership for quite some time, talking about you know, just the, the absolute sort of disaster of, of enforcement in Minneapolis that led to the killings of Alex Preddy and Renee Goode. And really trying at sometimes it seemed like to drive a wedge between Nome and the White House in some, some of the questions he was asking. So that was sort of unexpected as well.

[A]

Let's play the clip of him Kennedy asking about the use of ads. So the background here is DHS has ungodly amounts of money to spend because of the big beautiful bill, like insane amounts of money to spend. And I actually saw a data point on this ad impact which tracks all this stuff. Right. All the ad spending money that happens over the course of the of the election. They looked at expenditures today in the midterm election, and by far and away, the top overall advertiser for the midterm election cycle was the U.S. department of Homeland Security. $79 million in ads they've run. The next closest was Tom Steyer, Governor of California at $58 million. Anyway, so Kennedy's like, why are you running all these ads in which you, Kristi Noem, are basically right and center like, this is the Trump administration's immigration policy. Shouldn't this be about deportations? Here's how it went. Let's play the video.

[C]

But the president approved ahead of time. You spending $220 million running TV ads across the country in which you are featured prominently. Yes, sir. We went through the legal processes. Did it correct the President? Yes, he did. Yes. Okay. And one thing, Senator, I think would be helpful to know is how effective that communications has been. That overwhelming. Well, how effective in your name recognition? I mean, I personally just. I mean, to me, it puts the President in a terribly awkward spot. And it. And I just. I'm not saying you're not telling the truth. It's just hard for me to believe, knowing the president as I do, that you said, Mr. President, here's some ads I've cut and I'm going to spend $220 million running them. That he would have agreed to that.

[A]

All right, so, jvl, what do you make of that?

[C]

How could he ever possibly have known Kristi Noem would do this? Guys, I'm sorry, I don't mean to short circuit this whole exercise here, but watching people who voted to confirm her.

[A]

Right.

[C]

Suddenly get all chesty about,

[D]

I had no idea.

[C]

Go yourselves. That's basically how I feel about it. Go yourself, Kennedy. And I'm sorry. And he's. He's willing to take after Kristi Noem because he's too shy to go after Secretary Kennedy, who's bringing back measles. I'm sorry, but these people are menaces and they should get zero credit for. For now, belatedly in a committee meeting where they think that maybe they're actually helping Trump by separating the weak one from the herd. And, you know, maybe, maybe if they, so long as they don't blame Donald Trump or say that the mission is bad or say that, boy, gee, I guess we shouldn't have given you guys 11 to gajillion dollars. Long as they don't do that, then they're. They're being responsible people working in government.

[A]

Right? I mean, Kennedy's point was he Went after her for the ads that she's run and whether or not she was being unfair to Stephen Miller, that was the other point of contention. How could you. How could you throw Mr. Miller under the bus? You know, that was it. So it wasn't like, you know, now he did. I will give him. I'm not giving him credit. I will say he did ask about the decision to call Renee Goode and Alex Preddy domestic terrorists. And Noam said what was. What was it? Interest drew some distinction. She's like, I didn't call them domestic terrorists, but I said, they may have engaged in acts of domestic terrorism. As if there's a fucking difference.

[B]

Yes, she said that. She said a bunch of different things. She said 15 different things. I don't know if we have clips of this, but. But it was. It was some of that. It was some of. Well, look, you know, it was a chaotic situation, and I was responding to reports from the ground, and. And, you know, I can't imagine what her parents went. What their parents went through.

[C]

I was just relying on what my agents told me.

[A]

Yeah, that was it. Yeah, that was it.

[C]

Well, if. So, have those agents been fired because they lied to you and made you look like a fucking idiot?

[A]

Or just say, I regret saying it?

[C]

So if. If she was relying on the things from the agent told her, then the agents lied to her. And are they being held accountable? Are there. Are there HR proceedings against them?

[A]

No. Let. We could play Klobuchar, because I think Klobuchar pushed her specifically on this. And to your point, jbl, she never once says, I regret doing it. Ever. No, ever. She just said, well, I was given bad information, nary an apology, never saying, well, you know, we're looking into it. And I shouldn't have jumped to hasty conclusions or anything like that.

[C]

After the killings of Renee Good and Alex Preddy, when I spoke to Alex's parents, they told me that you calling him a domestic terrorist. This was directly from them. The day after he was killed, a nurse in our va, Alex. One of the most hurtful things they could ever imagine was said by you about their son. Do you have anything you want to say to Alex Preddy's parents? We were relying, in the hours after that incident that was so horrific on information we were getting from the graduates. If you had anything you wanted to say to the parents or to the family of Renee Goode after you called them domestic terrorists, I can't even imagine what they have gone through in the loss of their son and the loss of Their family members. But how about specifically calling them domestic terrorists without any evidence of that? Sir, ma', am, I did not call him a domestic terrorist. I said it appeared to be an incident of. I think the parents saw it for what it was. You frozen faced fucking ghoul. I really, I mean, I, I'm sorry and I. You know what? Clobo not doing the best job there. Like, not coming with the actual receipts. Not going at her hard, right? Not saying, oh, no, here's. Here's what you actually said.

[A]

They could have played the video.

[C]

Yeah, I'm sorry, I'm too hot for. For you. I know that. I know that we're all supposed to like, be, you know, playing it cool. It's a cool medium that YouTubers. Yeah, but this is like, this is unfucking believable.

[A]

Right?

[B]

It really does put. Just. I mean, like, we. It's all been happening out there for days and days and weeks and weeks, and we've been swimming in it. All the horror that's been coming out of Minneapolis, all of the just ridiculous decision making that happened to put those policies in place. And then just the, just the unbelievable way that her department at her leadership decided to respond in real time to all of these actions. I mean, I don't know, jbl, I thought Klobuchar did a pretty good job of putting the specific question to her of, look, a horrible thing happened and, and it was your people who did it. It was your people who killed these citizens. But it wasn't just that they harmed the families of Alex, Freddie and Renee Goode. You harmed them. You harmed them by immediately getting out there and smearing them in this way. And they said that that was actually maybe the most painful thing is seeing their government do that. And I mean, what's she gonna say? I mean, like, she's, she's. There's a reason why some Republicans want to hang her out to dry for this, right? I mean, there's a reason why, um, it's not a matter of credit, really. It's just. It's just like the, the, the bloodless real politic of this thing.

[A]

Let me play a game. What. What if you asked what she. What's she going to say? Would it really been that harmful to say we shouldn't have done it? We acted hastily? We spoke hastily. That would have been harmful cancer.

[C]

That. Not in Trump world, right? In Trump world, you can't ever. It's dominance politics and you cannot apologize. You cannot ever admit a mystique. In Trump world, that would get her fired.

[B]

And we've seen that. I mean, that's happened repeatedly in this administration. You know, any lawyer who, like, gives an inch in a court setting or whatever is immediately, you know, gets the shepherd's crook and gets yanked out of there. The only thing that is keeping Kristi Noem in her job, despite the fact that everybody knows what a dumpster fire she made of Minneapolis and has made of immigration enforcement all throughout the first year of Trump's term, the only thing that is keeping her in her job is the fact that Donald Trump still gives her sort of like the divine imprimatur. Right. I mean, she still has the mandate of heaven, even though so many people even in her own agency know that she's awful. They're gunning for her.

[C]

Corey has the mandate of heaven.

[B]

Yes, exactly. Cora Lewandowski, who. Who, you know, has an interesting.

[C]

Very special advisor.

[B]

Exactly.

[A]

They may or may not have a love plane. We don't know. We don't know. That did come up today, by the way, there asked. But love.

[B]

But, but. So she has only one mission, right? Her one mission is to continue to not lose the mandate of heaven. And that's why you can't apologize even though everybody knows that you have fucked this up.

[A]

So, but the context here. So here's. I want to just sort of hint at something that is in the air, which is that DHS funding is frozen right now. Okay? They obviously have a boatload of cash because of the big, beautiful bill, and they're, they're going to be fine. ICE is going to be fine for sure. But DHS funding itself is frozen. Republicans turning on Noem, in this context at least, Kennedy and Tillis, that we're going to talk about in a second. I don't know. There is a signal, there's some whiff up there that this is an effort for Republicans to try to signal to Democrats on the Hill, hey, if we get this person out, if we turn on this person, too, if we get new leadership at dhs, could we get to an agreement? That's. That seems to me to be the context here. Now let's turn to Tillis, because Tillis, look, it was heavy on theatrics. There were some actual news breaks here in that he said, you know, he wants the DHS inspector general report, which has been stimmied. He said he's going to hold any En Blanc nomination until he gets a response that's real. He says he will deny quorum on as many committees as I can. Denying a quorum on committees until he gets a response after two weeks. That's real. Like they need to actually have these quorums. So those are real steps. Everything else was very theatrical and enjoyable. Why don't we start and I know where JV is going to come down on this because Tills did vote for her. He did. And he only started speaking up once he decided to retire. Still, it was good theater. So let's start with the dog and then we'll get to the coverup.

[D]

You should know that if you're going out to a hunting lodge and you're putting pheasants out and you're putting dogs out, you don't take a puppy out there. A 14 month old dog is basically a teenager in dog years. You decided to kill that dog because you had not invested the appropriate time in training. And then you have the audacity to go into a book and say it's a leadership lesson about tough choices. It's in your book. We could play it if we had time. At that same lunch hour. You killed a goat. And you killed the goat because you said it was behaving badly. You are a farmer. You don't castrate a goat. They behave badly. You should have probably done that before. But my point point is those are bad decisions made in the heat of the moment. Not unlike what happened up in Minneapolis.

[A]

I think it is unlike what happened in Minneapolis. Also, I'm not sure about the Go Castration. I just not my area of expertise. Andrew and I were debating what the proper protocols were on Go castration. Jbl.

[C]

Was that book out before her confirmation hearing?

[A]

Yes, of course.

[C]

Okay, so. So now he views the information that he had prior to voting for her as disqualifying.

[A]

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[C]

here's why I'm so, so just ramped up about this. And so my cortisol is spiking, gentlemen. It's because these sit up there in rage without ever considering saying, I can't believe I voted for you. I made a huge mistake. I. I got snowed in by you. You are utterly incompetent. You should never have been in this job. The Senate failed in its mission and I personally in my job. Because you know what? Tillis is retiring.

[A]

Yeah.

[C]

He doesn't. He has nothing left to gain. This is what I'm saying. It's the, it's the utter lack of personal responsibility for a thing they helped happen. I just can't count on that. I'm sorry.

[A]

No, it's totally fair. He wants her fired, but he's not taking any responsibility for being there in the first place.

[C]

By the way, you know, a bunch of Democrats voted for her too.

[A]

Did Fetterman, I'm sure. Fetterman.

[C]

Fetterman. Tim Kane.

[A]

Tim Kane did.

[C]

Alyssa Slotkin, Maggie Hassan, Kim Peters.

[A]

No, I should have looked that up. We gotta ask.

[C]

I did.

[A]

About that.

[C]

I did. I don't know any of them have any second thoughts about this.

[A]

We should have anything to say to

[C]

the country for helping to put this woman into. In that job.

[B]

Can I say one thing about that? Because I think this is pretty illustrative of like, just something that's constantly happening with the Trump administration where like, everything is so bad all the time that like, things. People get passes on things and things slip through that are like, totally unconscionable on the merits. Like if you think back to the confirmation, you know, when Trump was putting his cabinet together, we were all hair on fire about Robert F. Kennedy Jr. We were all hair on fire about Matt Gaetz. I don't remember even remember who some of the other, like truly, Pete Hegseth was, Was one of the, was one of the.

[C]

Tulsi Gabbard.

[B]

Tulsi Gabbard and Patel. Yeah, exactly.

[A]

There were, there were, there were several

[B]

in kind of in the midst of all of that, you know, it's like, well, and then Donald Trump, you know, who got reelected to do like the mass deportations. I guess he gets to put somebody in charge to do mass duplications. I guess we're glad it's not actually like Corey Lewandowski who's going to be running the Department of Security. It' this governor who you know, CPAC really likes, whatever wave her through. And like it's not that. It's, it's not that there was not plenty of evidence to suggest that she was kind of an insane person before. I mean you talk about everything she put in that book. You talk about, you know, the, the sort of like abortive pre presidential campaign she kind of tried to run. I mean like there was, there were, there were warning signs. But like when, when you compared her to those lunatics in, in advance, you can kind of see how these people have, some of these people got there. The problem is like that was already working with such a skewed view of reality because you were comparing her to some of like the biggest cranks in human history who also all got through, by the way, other than Matt Gaetz.

[A]

Here's a little trivia. Who is Donald Trump's first DHS secretary?

[B]

I don't know how to pronounce her name. Nielsen or. No, that was second. The first one was Kelly.

[A]

No, John Kelly. First one, yeah.

[C]

Look at that.

[A]

Yeah, he went and Nielsen. Yeah. So Kelly Nielsen ended up becoming soft spoke critics. Yeah.

[C]

I mean, am I wrong that there should be some accountability for, for Democrats who voted for this? Because one of the things that happened is we get into confirmation world and everyone's like, well, I can't vote against all of them because that'll look so partisan. I gotta find someone I can say yes to. And you know what, like if you're, if you were Alyssa Slotkin, you said yes to this. You should have your face rubbed in it, I think and you should have to answer for it and explain why you did it and why you think you were wrong. If you think you're wrong, maybe Alyssa Slotkin stands by that vote. And then what she's going to do differently going forward in her approach to handling the Trump administration.

[A]

This is the type of vote that if you have aspirations for higher office beyond the Senate, let's say you want to run for president, it will be held against you. People will absolutely hammer you for this vote. There will be consequences. And you're probably right. She, it would behoove her to get ahead of it now and just be like, if you're slacking, just be like, biggest regret in my life. That type of thing. But this will haunt her for sure.

[C]

But this is how you stop people from doing this stuff in the future.

[A]

Right?

[C]

I mean, if you. I. This isn't purely about, like just getting, you know, accountability for the sake of accountability. Although that's nice. It would be nice to have some of that. Feels like we live in a world with almost zero accountability for anybody. But if the idea is this whole process is broken because you have people in the United States Senate who simply do not take their jobs seriously when it comes to advising consent and the confirmation of cabinet level nominees. The only way to do that is to punish people who, who treat it like a joke.

[A]

Right. There's a number I'm sort of confused with this because I'm looking up the roll call now. There are seven people who did. Seven senators who did not vote. And I can't. Why. I'm just rap. I can't remember this. I will note that Raphael Warnock was one of them. Yep. Brian Schottz was another one who did not vote.

[C]

Somebody from Hawaii.

[A]

Yeah. Brian, shots.

[C]

Yeah, yeah.

[A]

Let me, let me just close with the. Because I want to give. I know, I know we're being rightfully hard on tennis for not doing more and not explaining the roads, but I do want to give at least a little bit of kudos to Tillis because there are ways to go out of office that you can just slink and say, you know what, I'm going to just get a lobbying gig and I'm not going to rock the boat. And, you know, I got to still work in this town. I don't want to like fuck over Trump and all that stuff, whatever. This guy at least is putting some elbow grease into the criticisms here and he has spoken out, unlike a lot of his other retiring Republican colleagues, about what happened in Minnesota. Okay. And like, he's been very, very critical of this. I want to play him talking about the COVID up here because this was a moment. I don't know, maybe I'm a sucker for this shit, but I genuinely thought that here's a guy who is pissed, who really doesn't like what happened and doesn't want to see it happen again. So let's play the clip and you can tell me why I'm wrong.

[D]

The way you're going about deporting them is wrong. The fact that you can't admit to a mistake which looks like under investigation, it's going to prove that Ms. Good and Mr. Pretty probably should not have been shot in the face and in the back. Law enforcement needs to learn from that. You don't protect them by not looking after the facts. Not only should the FBI be investigating it, but every single law enforcement agency in that jurisdiction should be invited to it so our law enforcement officers do not have this palm cast upon them. One of the reasons why ICE officers are having threats and damn the people that threaten ICE officers, because so many of them are doing a good job, is because you've cast a pall on them by acting like we should investigate things differently. Officer involved shootings have a formula that we should go through every time.

[A]

All right, the ICE part, no, the first part, yes. Am I wrong?

[C]

I mean, I genuinely struggle with this because I. You're not wrong. This is a case of defining deviancy down. Right? And so it's only when you compare him against the people who are doing much, much worse.

[A]

Right.

[C]

That you start to say, well, then, you know, like, yeah, he's. And I guess everything is relative, right? I mean, you can't let the perfect be the enemy of the good. And if you want more people doing what Thom Tillis should do, then you shouldn't sit here like, I am screaming at him. I take all of that. But this isn't early days. You know, it's not 2017, when the future is still uncertain and we don't quite know where it's heading. And maybe it won't be so bad. Like, we do have masked secret police running around the country abducting people and killing citizens. We do have journalists being arrested. We do have an unconstitutional war going on. Like, I feel like we know directionally where this is all heading, and everyone's just kind of hoping that it works out fine. Right? But I don't know. I don't. Andrew, where are you on this? You are typically much more sensible. Sensible than I am.

[B]

I just wanted to say. I don't know about that. I just wanted to say one thing about sort of the direction of these things, because both Tillis and Kennedy do sort of the same thing where they are kind of trying to, like, send Kristi Noem out as the scapegoat bearing the sins of the government into the wilderness. Right? And Kennedy was a little bit more sort of like, you know, blunt about it. He's like, how dare you impugn our great patriots like Stephen Miller? Uh, but. But even Tillis a little bit, is doing that with that. With the line about ice. There where he's basically saying, like, look, like most, for the most part, this agency is doing exactly what we want it to be doing. And it's, you know, it's the brave men and women and the patriots of ice and it's really just Christie's fault that, that things are bad. But like, this kind of gets to what you were saying a minute ago, Sam, about, about this actually being. And again, I don't know whether Tillis or Kennedy have this specifically in their mind, but there does appear to be this effort to, to make her the scapegoat for all of this stuff and to cast her out instead of getting any of the totally obviously needed and like perfectly reasonable and honestly kind of minor reforms to DHS that Democrats are demanding in order to fund the agency, which is stuff like keep your body cams on and your masks off and wear a badge and a uniform and like, do targeted enforcement and don't randomly sweep up protesters and people that you think look like they could be illegal because they're minorities. Like, like the idea that this would be the pitch, again, I don't know, 100% that this is what Tillis or what Kennedy is thinking, but that's kind of the upshot of, of these lines of attack, right? Is like, let's all agree that it's Christie who's the problem and then we can get her out of there and ICE can go back to, you know, doing its great patriotic work without any of these reforms that Democrats have demanded. And I think if Democrats were to

[C]

accept that, it would be such a good point, Andrew. And in a way it makes it more dangerous, right? I mean, I. Not everyone needs to be a crazy pants accelerationist the way I am, but saying like, yes, all of this stuff is fundamentally good and we should be doing it, but we should be doing it more quietly so that people don't get upset about it. And so your sin, Kristi Noem is doing it publicly and making people upset. That's dangerous, right? That's. That is swapping out Bovino for Homan in Minneapolis while you're still doing all the same stuff. And I don't know that that actually helps.

[A]

No, probably doesn't help. All right, I have one last thing I want to mention, but I'm going to leave it after this. Katie Britt. Katie Britt had a very glossy New York Times piece written about her about how she could not stop thinking about Liam Ramos, the five year old kid who was abducted from a school in Minneapolis. We talked to the superintendent of the school district when we were up there and sent to Texas and had a huge ordeal, ended up back in Minneapolis. But Katie Bear could not stop thinking about this and she had a huge piece in the New York Times about how concerned she was about Liam Ramos and how it affected her and her family life and all that stuff. She had a chance to ask Christine questions today as part of the Judiciary Committee, and I listened to the whole thing because I assume someone who was deeply moved by the Liam Rama story and couldn't stop thinking about it would ask a question about it. She did not. Not a single question about Liam Ramos. It was about how ICE had arrested people like Jared Fogel, the old subway guy, and P. Diddy and how they were not Nazis. So that was how Katie Brit spent her time, apparently not thinking about Liam Ramos, at least in that 10 minutes I've been. So I'm going to leave it at that. JVL Andrew, thanks for joining me. Really appreciate it. For those who watched, thank you for watching. Subscribe to the feed where you get great recaps like this. Talk to you guys later.