Cole Welsh, Editor

While its funding remains up in the air, the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) will officially have a new leader in Markwayne Mullin.

Mullin, who most recently served as Oklahoma’s junior senator to the US Senate, was confirmed in a 54-45 vote as part of a rather quick approval process.

The previous secretary, Kristi Noem, was removed from her role several weeks ago, capping off a rocky year at the helm of DHS. In recent months, Noem came under fire for the department’s handling of the killing of two US citizens during immigration operations in Minneapolis and significant amounts of ad spending.

Now, Noem serves as President Trump’s special envoy for the Shield of the Americas, a US-led regional security organization seeking to coordinate efforts to combat organized crime, drug trafficking and illegal immigration through the Western Hemisphere.

A staunch Trump supporter, Mullin is seen as an unconventional pick to lead the nation’s newest cabinet department.

The only member of the Senate without a bachelor’s degree, Mullin is a former mixed martial arts (MMA) fighter and the owner of a plumbing business.

He first became a senator after winning a special election in 2022. Prior to that, Mullin served as a congressman for 10 years representing Oklahoma’s 2nd congressional district.

During his confirmation hearing, Mullin promised a revamped approach to conducting immigration enforcement, pledging that he would be “protecting everybody” as secretary.

Kentucky Senator Rand Paul, who holds libertarian views and frequently bucks Trump’s agenda, was the only Republican to vote against Mullin’s nomination.

Two Democrats, Pennsylvania Senator John Fetterman and New Mexico Senator Martin Heinrich, broke from their party to support Trump’s pick. While Fetterman signaled early on that he would vote to confirm Mullin, Heinrich’s support was less expected.

Mullin’s confirmation comes amid the department’s funding debacle, which Trump has blamed on congressional Democrats for failing to pass appropriations.

In the wake of the killings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti by federal law enforcement, Democrats withheld their support and forced a shutdown of DHS after Republicans refused to negotiate any reforms to ICE and Customs and Border Protection.

Even with the new leadership, Democrats have made it clear that their opposition will continue unless Republicans agree to add restrictions on ICE and border patrol agents. Two of the main sticking points are banning agents from wearing masks and requiring judicial warrants for them to conduct raids on private property.

However, as DHS is responsible for much more than just immigration enforcement and border security, this lack of funding has hit many other functions of the department just as hard.

Due to the shutdown, thousands of TSA agents and other DHS employees have been working without pay. As a result, many TSA personnel have called out sick or quit altogether, leaving many air travelers stuck in long security lines.

To mitigate these staffing shortages, Trump recently dispatched ICE officers to airports across the country. While some were initially concerned that this deployment of ICE would expand immigration enforcement into routine travel, their presence has been largely limited to crowd control, ID checks and monitoring exits.

Recently, Trump signed an executive order declaring staffing shortages at airports to be a national emergency. In doing so, he ordered funding from the One Big Beautiful Bill to go toward paying TSA agents.

Nevertheless, as neither party seems willing to budge at the moment, an end to this budgetary standstill is not yet in sight.