Senate Confirms Markwayne Mullin as 9th Secretary of Homeland Security, 54-45

Attorney General Pam Bondi swore in Markwayne Mullin as the 9th Secretary of Homeland Security in an Oval Office ceremony Tuesday, March 24, with his wife Christine and family looking on. President Donald Trump, who introduced Mullin before the oath, told the assembled crowd: "I said, there's one man for this job and I have no doubt he's going to be fantastic." Stepping to the microphone afterward, Mullin said the swearing-in was "the most nervous" he'd ever been and made a pointed promise about his leadership style: "I don't care what color your state is, I don't care if you're red or you're blue, at the end of the day my job is to be secretary of homeland and to protect everybody the same and we will do that."

The Senate confirmed Mullin in a 54-45 vote Monday evening. He garnered support from two Democrats: New Mexico Sen. Martin Heinrich, who said in a statement that he doesn't believe Mullin will be "bullied" or allow himself to "take orders from Stephen Miller" at the White House, and Pennsylvania Sen. John Fetterman. Rand Paul, the sole Republican to oppose Mullin's confirmation, chairs the committee that conducted his confirmation hearing and wasted no time conveying his distaste for Mullin, quickly calling him out for allegedly calling him a "freaking snake," along with saying he understood why a neighbor attacked Paul in 2017.

That feud nearly derailed the nomination before it reached the Senate floor. Mullin narrowly made it through the nomination process after clashing with Paul, needing a Democratic ally to get his nomination out of committee after Paul's no vote. Fetterman provided the necessary vote to advance the nomination to the full Senate.

Mullin's confirmation makes him the first Native American to lead the Department of Homeland Security and the second Native person to lead a cabinet agency. The 48-year-old business owner and former MMA fighter has been known to work across the aisle and has strong relationships with some Democrats, which Heinrich and Fetterman cited for their support. Mullin first became a senator in 2023 after serving in the House for a decade prior to that.

The confirmation hearing on March 18 was one of the most combative in recent memory. Republican Homeland Security Committee Chairman Rand Paul cast doubt on whether the Oklahoma Republican had the temperament to lead the department of more than 260,000 employees, reprising a long-simmering feud in which Mullin called him a "snake." Mullin admitted he made a mistake calling Alex Pretti, the Minnesotan killed by immigration officers in January, a "deranged individual," and also said he would scrap Kristi Noem's controversial FEMA policy requiring her personal signoff for any spending request over $100,000. He also indicated that agents will be required to secure judicial warrants to enter homes and businesses, marking a key change from DHS' previous position.

Trump's former Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem departed as head of the agency in early March after a pair of tumultuous hearings on Capitol Hill that revealed she spent $220 million on a controversial ad campaign that she said Trump approved, and some lawmakers and administration officials indicated that was the "last straw" following the killing of two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis that sparked public outrage.

Mullin inherits a department under extraordinary strain. DHS has been shut down since February 14, and the funding impasse is now entangled with a separate political fight. At the swearing-in, Trump said the department "is currently shut down by radical left Democrat thugs in Congress," criticizing their failure to support the Save America Act as well. Democrats have withheld funding for TSA and other DHS subagencies to force changes to ICE and Customs and Border Protection operations. Trump has responded by deploying ICE agents to airports to relieve long lines during the budget standoff, with Senate Republicans now expressing optimism that they have a path to reopening the Department of Homeland Security.

Mullin pledged that "failure is not an option" as he took over an agency at one of its most turbulent moments. Oklahoma Gov. Kevin Stitt named energy executive Alan Armstrong to fill Mullin's Senate seat on Tuesday, the same day Democrats flipped a Florida state House district that includes Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort. Mullin's stated goal in office is decidedly unglamorous: he told the Senate at his confirmation hearing that he wants the department off the front page within six months.