WASHINGTON — U.S. Sen. Markwayne Mullin of Oklahoma, the president’s pick to lead the Department of Homeland Security, on Wednesday in his confirmation hearing was challenged with questions about his “anger issues” by the fellow Republican who heads the Senate committee that oversees the department.

Kentucky Republican Sen. Rand Paul, chair of the Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs, at the outset of the hearing recalled how Mullin called him a “freaking snake” and expressed sympathy for a neighbor who assaulted Paul in a 2017 dispute, breaking six of his ribs and damaging a lung.

“You have never had the courage to look me in the eye and tell me that the assault was justified,” Paul said to Mullin, nominated by President Donald Trump to replace Kristi Noem as secretary of the 260,000-employee agency. “Tell it to my face, if that’s what you believe.”

In a tense back-and-forth, Mullin defended himself and said he never “supported” that Paul was assaulted, but that he “understood” why the neighbor attacked Paul.

“I think everybody in this room knows that I’m very blunt,” Mullin, a former MMA fighter who physically challenged a witness testifying before Congress in 2023, said. 

Paul criticized him and “this machismo that you have” and raised concerns about how Mullin could lead a department and “why (the American public) should trust a man with anger issues to set the proper example for ICE and Border Patrol agents.” 

Noem was ousted from the job after a national uproar over the killing of two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis in January by immigration agents and public disapproval of aggressive enforcement tactics there and in Los Angeles and Chicago.

“I just wonder if someone who applauds violence against their political opponents is the right person to lead an agency that has struggled to accept limits to the proper use of force,” Paul said. 

Mullin did not apologize for his comments regarding Paul’s assault, and said that leading DHS is “bigger than the political differences we have.”

Mullin detailed his plans to senators, pledging to reverse several policies of his predecessor, including making sure “DHS isn’t on the news every day.” 

Mullin also promised to get DHS fully funded and continue to carry out the president’s mass deportation agenda. 

If confirmed, he will have access to a special funding stream of $175 billion for DHS included in 2025’s “one big, beautiful” tax and spending cut package, which Mullin backed as a senator. 

Post-Noem era

Trump shifted Noem, the former governor of South Dakota, into another administration position earlier this month. 

Her tenure drew bipartisan ire over her quick judgment to label the two U.S. citizens killed by immigration agents as domestic terrorists, her stalling of disaster relief grants for states, and the award of a $220 million no-bid contract for an ad campaign to a firm owned by a subordinate’s spouse. 

Paul said the committee plans to vote Thursday on whether to advance Mullin’s nomination to the Senate floor. Trump has said he wants Mullin on the job by the end of the month.

If the Senate confirms Mullin, he would be the first Native American to lead DHS. He is an enrolled member of the Cherokee Nation. 

Senate Majority Leader John Thune, Republican of South Dakota, told reporters Wednesday that he was confident Mullin could be confirmed as Homeland Security secretary. 

“Rand and Markwayne have some personal history which they’re going to have to work through,” Thune said. “But this is about the job, and it’s about who ought to fill that job. We all believe … that Markwayne is the right guy for the job.”

One Democrat already a yes

The junior senator from Oklahoma, who was elected to the Senate in a 2022 special election, does not need any Democratic support to be confirmed to lead the agency, since Republicans control the chamber with 53 seats.

And even without Paul’s support, one Democrat, Sen. John Fetterman of Pennsylvania, who sits on the committee, has already pledged his vote. 

Mullin, if confirmed, will take over a department shut down since early February, after Democrats refused to vote for fiscal year 2026 funding unless changes to immigration enforcement are made following the deaths of the two U.S. citizens in Minneapolis, Renee Good and Alex Pretti. 

The top Democrat on Homeland Security, Gary Peters, pressed Mullin about his previous comments about Good and Pretti. Mullin joined top Trump officials in accusing both of being agitators. 

Mullin admitted his mistake and said he was too quick to judge. 

“I shouldn’t have said that,” Mullin said. “I went out there too fast. I was responding immediately without the facts. That’s my fault. That won’t happen as (Homeland Security) secretary.”

Noem has never admitted she was wrong to label Good, a mother of three and poet, and Pretti, an intensive care unit nurse who specialized in care for veterans, as domestic terrorists. She was criticized by both Democrats and Republicans for her comments.

On Wednesday, Republicans on the panel largely praised Mullin, except for Paul, and criticized Democrats for not approving government funding for DHS.

House Democrats are trying to force a legislative procedure to bring a funding bill for DHS that does not include any appropriations for U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and Customs and Border Protection.

ICE questions

Michigan Democratic Sen. Elissa Slotkin pressed Mullin on reforms he would make to ICE. 

Sen. Richard Blumenthal, Democrat of Connecticut, asked Mullin about an arrest quota of 3,000 immigrants daily that White House senior advisor Stephen Miller, the main architect of the Trump administration’s immigration policy, has set for ICE officers.

“I can’t speak for Stephen Miller,” Mullin said. “No quota has been set for me.”

Blumenthal also pressed Mullin about concerns over violations of the 4th Amendment of the Constitution by federal immigration agents entering homes and businesses without a judicial warrant. 

He asked Mullin if he would “commit that ICE will no longer instruct agents to break into people’s homes without a judicial warrant?”

“Sir, you’re using the word ‘break into’ people’s houses loosely,” Mullin said. “We will not enter a home or place of business without a judicial warrant unless we’re pursuing an individual that runs into a business or resident.”

Blumenthal also addressed Noem’s award of the $220 million no-bid contract, which she was grilled about by unhappy Republicans in a congressional hearing shortly before Trump removed her as secretary of DHS.

Mullin said that he would let the inspector general, an independent agency within DHS, continue with an investigation. 

“I’ll leave that to the (Inspector General),” Mullin said.  

Detention warehouse purchases

Democrats pressed Mullin if he would keep certain policies in place made by Noem, whose last day is March 31, and questioned recent moves by DHS to purchase warehouses across the country for mass detention of immigrants in the country without legal status. 

New Jersey Sen. Andy Kim said a policy from Noem has led to a backlog in Federal Emergency Management Agency relief. Noem instituted a requirement that she had to personally sign off on any FEMA award totaling more than $100,000. 

Kim asked Mullin if he would consider getting rid of that policy.

“Absolutely,” Mullin said. “That is micromanaging.”

Kim also brought up a warehouse recently purchased by DHS in Roxbury, New Jersey, to detain up to 1,500 immigrants that has concerned local community leaders.

“Most municipalities don’t have the capacity and their infrastructure for waste and water” to handle a warehouse that is meant to detain people, Kim said. 

“This town has only 42 foot police officers, a volunteer fire department. Does that sound like the kind of town that has resources to take on a warehouse?” he asked Mullin.

Mullin did not say DHS would stop its warehouse initiative, but said he wanted to make sure that the local communities were on board, and pledged to personally visit that location with Kim to meet with leaders. 

New Hampshire’s Democratic Sen. Maggie Hassan also raised the issue of a warehouse location in her state. DHS initially planned to purchase a warehouse in Merrimack to retrofit the facility to detain immigrants, but backed off.

She asked Mullin if he would “ensure that the plan remains off the table?” 

Mullin said he wasn’t caught up on that specific facility, but that he would work to get the local community’s input.  

More FEMA questions

Fellow Oklahoma Republican Sen. James Lankford asked Mullin how he sees the future of FEMA. The president has expressed his desire to dismantle the agency, and a FEMA review council was formed to issue a report on its findings. 

Mullin said that FEMA should not be considered a first response agency, and that when natural disasters strike, it’s the state response that is first. 

“We can be more effective and be more direct and speed it up,” he said. 

Mullin added that he doesn’t believe FEMA should be dismantled, but that it could be restructured. 

Mullin’s overseas ventures

The top Republican and Democrat on the committee, Paul and Peters, grilled Mullin on his past comments on a 2016 international trip taken while he served in the House. During a Fox News interview, Mullin implied he had been on military missions and could “smell war.” Mullin has not served in the military.

Mullin declined to discuss those comments, arguing that the travel was while he was on official duty and classified. He described those trips as for training purposes.

Peters asked why the trip wasn’t included in his disclosure records to the committee, and Mullin argued that because it was considered official travel, he didn’t need to disclose it.

Paul said he would consider postponing the committee’s vote unless Mullin would agree to visit a secure facility where classified matters are discussed, known as a SCIF, to detail his international travel. 

Mullin said he would go to a SCIF with lawmakers ahead of the committee vote Thursday. 

Jennifer Shutt contributed to this report.

 

A border patrol agent stands in front of protestors as people gather near the scene of 26th Street West and Nicollet Avenue, where federal agents shot and killed a 37-year-old man Saturday, Jan. 24, 2026, the third shooting in as many weeks. (Photo by Nicole Neri/Minnesota Reformer)

A Border Patrol agent warned Nicole Cleland last month that she’d be arrested if she were again discovered following and observing federal officers. 

Three days later, the 56-year-old Richfield resident received an email saying her expedited airport security screening privileges had been revoked.

Cleland is a frequent traveler and had held Global Entry and TSA PreCheck status without incident since 2014. So the timing of the notice seemed curious, she said in a sworn declaration filed in support of the American Civil Liberties Union’s lawsuit challenging federal law enforcement tactics in Minnesota. The Border Patrol and Transportation Security Administration are both subdivisions of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, as is U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

“Given that only three days had passed from the time that I was stopped, I am concerned that the revocation was the result of me following and observing the agents. This is intimidation and retaliation,” Cleland said in the declaration.  

A year into the second Trump administration’s immigration crackdown, Cleland is one of countless U.S. residents and visitors touched by the federal government’s rapidly changing data collection and surveillance apparatus. Some, like an AI-powered social media analyzer and an error-prone facial recognition tool, evoke dystopian sci-fi. Others, like automatic license plate readers, have been around for decades. 

Elected officials, privacy advocates, and ordinary community members working as constitutional observers are increasingly alarmed that the Trump administration could use these tools to chill constitutionally protected expression, while at the same time pressuring tech companies — many of which have cozied up to Trump in his second term — to make it harder for Americans to keep tabs on their government. 

Senior administration officials haven’t done much to dispel those concerns. Tom Homan, the “border czar” who’s now the face of Operation Metro Surge in Minnesota, said on Jan. 15 that he’s pushing to create a “database” of people who “interfere or impede or assault an ICE officer.” 

Such a database wouldn’t outwardly differ much from the numerous information repositories the federal government already maintains. But its purpose — and, in some cases, the tools used to collect and analyze the data — may prove to be a new frontier in the emerging surveillance state.  

Facial recognition software

The Border Patrol agent who warned Cleland told her his unit had “facial recognition,” according to her deposition.

Reporting by 404 Media and other media outlets indicates that ICE and other federal immigration enforcement agencies use multiple AI-powered facial recognition tools, including Mobile Fortify and Clearview AI. Local law enforcement agencies deputized to work with ICE use a different facial recognition app, Mobile Identify, according to NPR.

DHS has used facial recognition software at airports and land border crossings for years, but its use in the field is a more recent development that civil liberties experts say represents a major expansion of government surveillance. 

Using proprietary algorithms, the tools try to match images captured in the field with data already in DHS databases, including names, birthdates, citizenship status and photos taken at U.S. entry points. DHS says it retains “biographic exit data” on U.S. citizens and permanent residents for 15 years, though it’s unclear whether this applies to images collected in the field as well.

Even before Operation Metro Surge began in earnest, lawmakers sounded alarms about the implications.

“This type of on-demand surveillance is harrowing and it should put all of us on guard,” U.S. Sen. Ed Markey, a Massachusetts Democrat, told NPR in November.

Human analytics apps

ICE also uses AI-powered apps to analyze social media activity and other digital data points to create “life profiles” for people of interest.

The agency has spent at least $5 million on Tangles, a sophisticated tool developed by a company with ties to Israel’s cyber-intelligence community, Forbes reported in September. Tangles mines social media posts, event sign-ups, mobile contacts, location data and more to create nuanced individual portraits and tease out patterns of activity — including organizing and protest — in specific places.

“Our powerful web intelligence solution monitors online activity, collecting and analyzing data of endless digital channels – from the open, deep and dark web, to mobile and social,” Tangles’ Microsoft Marketplace listing says.

The Verge reported in October that ICE has spent a similar amount on another digital monitoring tool called Zignal Labs, which uses AI text and video analysis to process billions of social media posts daily into what it calls “curated detection feeds.” The product includes near real-time alerts. “Sample workflows” featured in a Zignal Labs marketing pamphlet shared with The Lever include “an ongoing operation in Gaza” and a 2023 social media post purporting to show U.S. Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh at the Mall of America.

Cellular snooping

Since September 2024, ICE has paid more than $1.6 million to a Maryland company that integrates a type of cell-site simulator popularly known as a “stingray” into government vehicles. 

TechCrunch first reported the purchases, which are a matter of public record. It’s unclear how often ICE uses vehicles equipped with stingrays in its operations, but a Utah judge reportedly authorized the agency to use one to track down a specific individual last summer. 

Stingrays trick nearby cell phones into connecting with them instead of legitimate transmitters, collecting reams of random users’ data in the process. That, plus past instances of warrantless snooping, makes them controversial even among law enforcement agencies. Ars Technica reported in 2015 that the FBI required local law enforcement agencies to drop cases rather than reveal evidence in court that “would potentially or actually compromise the equipment/technology.”

ICE is also interested in using — and may already be using — another cell-snooping tool that requires no external hardware. 

Last summer, the independent national security journalist Jack Poulson reported that the agency had reactivated a $2 million contract with the Israeli spyware developer Paragon Solutions. Once delivered via text message — no link required — Paragon’s spyware gains broad access to a phone’s contents, including encrypted messages.

“It’s an extremely dangerous surveillance tech that really goes against our Fourth Amendment protections,” Jeramie Scott, senior counsel at the Electronic Privacy Information Center, told NPR in November.