The vote was 54-45. Markwayne Mullin, Republican senator from Oklahoma, is now Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security — a 260,000-employee agency whose sub-components include Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), the Transportation Security Administration (TSA), Customs and Border Protection (CBP), FEMA, the Secret Service, and the Coast Guard.
He replaces Kristi Noem, whom Trump fired after reportedly becoming dissatisfied with her personal appearances in a series of DHS advertisements. Mullin's stated goal is more modest than his predecessor's: "My goal in six months is that we're not in the lead story every single day."
Given what he's walking into, that goal will be tested immediately.
The Vote: Rand Paul No, Fetterman and Heinrich Yes
The confirmation vote broke mostly along party lines. One Republican broke from his party; two Democrats crossed over.
Rand Paul (R-KY) — No: Paul's opposition is consistent with his libertarian skepticism of executive branch power and immigration enforcement operations. He has previously opposed expansive ICE authorities and has been the lone Republican to vote against multiple Trump nominees. His opposition to Mullin is not surprising given his track record.
John Fetterman (D-PA) — Yes: Fetterman endorsed Mullin shortly after his nomination. Fetterman has positioned himself as a centrist Democrat on immigration, supporting stricter border enforcement and crossing party lines on related votes. His support for Mullin is consistent with that positioning.
Martin Heinrich (D-NM) — Yes: The surprise vote. Heinrich called Mullin a "friend" and released a statement with a pointed assessment: "I look forward to having a secretary who doesn't take their orders from Stephen Miller." Heinrich's vote reflects the unusual position of a Democratic senator from a border state who believes Mullin might run DHS with more independence from White House immigration hardliners than Noem did.
The Heinrich statement is the most politically significant element of the confirmation. It signals that at least one Democrat believes Mullin could be a check on Miller's influence within DHS — a notable bet given Mullin's stated commitment to implementing Trump's immigration policies.
Who Is Markwayne Mullin?
Mullin, 46, is a former House representative who was elected Oklahoma's junior senator in 2022. Before entering politics, he ran a plumbing business — Mullin Plumbing — that he inherited from his father and grew to approximately 120 employees before selling it upon entering Congress.
He is a Trump loyalist who was among the senators who challenged the 2020 election results. He is known for a confrontational personal style — he famously challenged a union leader to a fistfight during a Senate hearing in 2023, stating "I'll donate to the charity of your choice" if the union leader would fight him. The chair gaveled the exchange down.
At his confirmation hearing last week, Mullin struck a notably different tone from his Senate floor persona — diplomatic, measured, expressing regret for having described a US citizen killed by ICE agents in Minneapolis as "a deranged individual that came in to cause maximum damage." He either deflected or declined to answer Democrat questions about specific immigration tactics and enforcement priorities.
His stated management philosophy is low-profile: he wants DHS "not in the lead story every single day." This is a deliberate contrast to Noem, whose Trump-era DHS tenure was marked by prominent media appearances and a personal brand that eventually became a liability.
What Mullin Inherits: The DHS Shutdown
DHS has been in partial shutdown since mid-February 2026. The timeline:
Democrats rejected DHS funding legislation because it did not include new guardrails on immigration enforcement operations. Their demands arose after ICE agents killed two US citizens during a weeks-long intensive enforcement operation in Minneapolis. Democrats demanded: a ban on ICE agents wearing masks during operations, a requirement that agents display identification, adherence to use-of-force rules, and mandatory investigation of violations.
Republicans have not agreed to these conditions. The partial shutdown has continued. ICE and immigration enforcement agencies have not been directly affected — Republicans authorized separate spending for immigration enforcement operations through the One Big Beautiful Bill Act passed last year. TSA, however, is funded through normal appropriations. TSA agents — designated essential workers — are legally required to work during shutdowns without pay.
The practical effect: TSA staffing has declined as agents without pay find other work or simply don't show up. Airports including LaGuardia (already dealing with a fatal collision investigation), JFK, O'Hare, and Atlanta have reported multi-hour security lines. Trump has deployed ICE agents to assist with airport security — a move that has generated its own controversy given ICE's immigration enforcement mandate and the optics of armed immigration agents in civilian airport security lines.
Mullin's immediate task as secretary is resolving the funding standoff, which Trump has now further complicated by demanding Democrats also support the Save America Act — a voter ID legislation bill — as a condition for any DHS funding deal. This adds a new, unrelated political condition to a spending negotiation that was already deadlocked.
The Minneapolis Deaths: The Context That Drove the Shutdown
The immediate trigger for the DHS funding fight was the killing of two US citizens during an ICE operation in Minneapolis. ICE agents conducting an intensive enforcement sweep killed two people who turned out to be US citizens.
Mullin, before his confirmation, described one of the victims — Alex Pretti — as "a deranged individual that came in to cause maximum damage." At his confirmation hearing, he expressed regret for that characterization. What he did not do was commit to changing the enforcement tactics that led to the deaths.
Democrats have demanded investigation and accountability for the Minneapolis deaths as part of any funding deal. The administration has resisted. The impasse is not just about masks and ID requirements — it is about whether ICE enforcement operations will face any external accountability mechanism.
Mullin's response to questions about keeping ICE away from polling stations was particularly notable. Asked whether he would commit to keeping immigration agents away from polling places during the November elections, he declined: "I don't understand what the concern about enforcing immigration at polling places is anyways. Because, honestly, if you're not a citizen, you sho—" The quote was cut off in reporting, but the framing — treating the concern as illegitimate — is itself a political signal.
The Midterm Math
Mullin takes over DHS as immigration enforcement is becoming a political liability for Republicans ahead of November midterms. The Guardian specifically notes that polls show Trump's immigration policies are "growing increasingly unpopular among the public" — particularly in the suburban districts that flipped to Republicans in 2024 and that are now the most competitive seats in the House.
The dynamic is familiar from previous cycles: aggressive enforcement that plays well in Republican primaries can alienate moderate suburban voters in general elections. The specific vulnerability in 2026 is the combination of:
- Airport disruption from the TSA shutdown, which affects travelers regardless of their politics
- ICE agents deployed at airports — visible and controversial
- The Minneapolis deaths of US citizens — a story that undermines the "enforcement only targets illegal immigrants" messaging
- The voter ID linkage Trump has now attached to the DHS funding deal — a move that Democrats will characterize as weaponizing immigration policy to suppress voter turnout
Mullin's "not in the lead story every single day" goal is a response to this political reality. Lower-profile enforcement that produces similar policy outcomes without generating the news cycles that Noem's tenure did is the strategy. Whether an agency as large and active as DHS can actually achieve that profile reduction in the middle of an enforcement-intensive administration is an open question.
DHS: What It Is and Why It Matters
The Department of Homeland Security was created in 2002 in the aftermath of September 11, consolidating 22 previously separate agencies into a single cabinet department. It is the third-largest federal department by employee count, behind only Defense and Veterans Affairs.
Its components relevant to current controversies:
- ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement): Immigration enforcement and deportation operations. ~20,000 employees. Now being deployed at airports.
- TSA (Transportation Security Administration): Airport security screening. ~65,000 employees. Currently in partial shutdown — essential workers required to work without pay.
- CBP (Customs and Border Protection): Border enforcement and customs inspection. ~65,000 employees. Includes Border Patrol.
- FEMA (Federal Emergency Management Agency): Disaster response and recovery. Critical given Iran-war energy crisis and ongoing Hawaii flooding.
- Secret Service: Protection of the president, vice president, and former presidents.
The breadth of the department means that Mullin is simultaneously responsible for immigration enforcement (his political priority), airport security (currently in crisis), disaster response (ongoing), and protective security (always ongoing). Managing all of these with a "stay out of the news" strategy is a significant operational challenge.
Markwayne Mullin is DHS secretary as of Monday evening. He inherits a shutdown, a staffing crisis, a Minneapolis accountability question he's declined to answer, and midterm election vulnerability. His predecessor got fired for being too visible. His challenge is to execute the same agenda while being less conspicuous. In a 260,000-employee department currently making daily news, that is a specific kind of hard.