Blumenthal to Noem: "You Have a Responsibility to Follow the Law"

[WASHINGTON, DC] – Today, U.S. Senator Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) pressed U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary Kristi Noem about the Department’s budget for Fiscal Year 2026 at a Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee hearing. At the hearing, Blumenthal raised concerns that DHS is recklessly spending taxpayer dollars and not following Congressional authorization for critical funding.

Blumenthal pointed to how DHS is unlawfully spending funds not authorized by Congress, stating, “Let me go to some of the expenditures that your department is making $200 million for an ad campaign fawning over President Trump[’s] supposed accomplishments, $21 million between January and April transporting around 400 immigrants to Guantanamo Bay—about half of them were flown back to the United States. Six million to El Salvador to imprison 300 individuals in a prison known for grave human rights violations and many more, including $1,000 to immigrants wishing to self-deport—I understand one of the planes left within the last 24 hours. None of these expenditures are in your present budget.”

Blumenthal also pressed Noem on recent reporting from The Washington Post

The full text of Blumenthal’s exchange with Noem is available below. The video of Blumenthal’s exchange with Noem is available here.

Sen. Blumenthal: Thank you for being here Madam Secretary. I’m sure you’ve seen the recent reports that your agency is going to sponsor a reality TV show in which immigrants would compete for U.S. citizenship. Is DHS seriously vetting a reality show for immigrants to obtain U.S. citizenship? Your spokesperson is quoted in the Wall Street Journal saying that it is in the very beginning stages of that vetting process. Each proposal undergoes a thorough vetting process—

Hon. Kristi Noem: Sir, we have no knowledge of a reality show. There may have been something submitted to the Department, but I did not know anything about this. Until the reporter reached out, we have no knowledge of it and they still printed wrong information. That article they had to change later because they lied so bad and have us on the record saying I had no knowledge of a reality show. The Department did not. There may have been something submitted along the line because there are proposals pitched to the Department but me and my executive team have no knowledge of the reality show. 

Sen. Blumenthal: No, I hope that your response is to confirm that you will not do a reality show—

Hon. Kristi Noem: There are no plans whatsoever to do a reality show.

Sen. Blumenthal: And that your spokesperson was completely misquoted as saying that it was being vetted—

Hon. Kristi Noem:  That article was completely inaccurate. Completely inaccurate and false, and the fact that they printed it when they knew it was false—

Sen. Blumenthal: Let me go to some of the expenditures that your Department is making, $200 million for an ad campaign fawning over President Trump[’s] supposed accomplishments, $21 million between January and April transporting around 400 immigrants to Guantanamo Bay, about half of them were flown back to the United States. Six million to El Salvador to imprison 300 individuals in a prison known for grave human rights violations and many more including $1,000 dollars to immigrants wishing to self-deport—I understand one of the planes left within the last 24 hours. None of these expenditures are in your present budget. Aren’t you going to run out of money before the end of this fiscal year if the continuing resolution does not cover any of them?

Hon. Kristi Noem: No, all of these dollars are being utilized as authorized and appropriately for the situation. And that flight that left—

Sen. Blumenthal: Well none of that was authorized though under the Continuing Resolution or any other way we normally authorize money. You are just spending recklessly, and it would seem wastefully without authorization. That is against the law.

Hon. Kristi Noem: Senator, I completely disagree with you. I am doing the job that the Secretary of Homeland Security is supposed to be doing, the one that the last Secretary refused to do, that endangered the future of our country.

Sen. Blumenthal: You may think you are doing the job, but you are under authorization that this Committee provides—you are acting in a way that you think you are doing your job but you also have a responsibility to follow the law.

Hon. Kristi Noem: The American people overwhelmingly in the last election said, “We want a secure border, we want to make sure no longer are the scales of justice tipped in the favor of criminals…”

Sen. Blumenthal: They did not tell you to act outside your legal authority and spend money that is not in your budget authorized by this Congress or any other Congress. Let me ask you about the money that is being used to supposedly repatriate Afghan allies, refugees from this country from the Taliban, Ukrainians, who have fled here from Russian aggression. Can you confirm that money is being taken from foreign aid allocation?

Hon. Kristi Noem: Are you talking about the Temporary Protective Status program? 

Sen. Blumenthal: Correct. The repatriation program supposedly of those individuals here under the Temporary Protective Status program.

Hon. Kristi Noem: So, we have thousands of individuals participating in the TPS program. That has been reevaluated to see if that program is still being utilized the way it was intended by congress when it was laid out. If that has been—

Sen. Blumenthal: There are documents that have been publicly reported that say the Administration is going to use money from the foreign aid program to send those people back to countries where they will be persecuted, tortured, and perhaps killed…Afghan allies who served us during our wars there, saved lives of American soldiers and diplomats, are going to be sent back to the Taliban using foreign aid money. Can you confirm that this is the plan that has been reported in the Washington Post this morning?

Hon. Kristi Noem: No, I won’t confirm that because that’s not true. Those individuals have an opportunity to apply for asylum and other programs where they will be protected if their lives are in danger from the government that’s in their country.

Sen. Blumenthal: There is a plan to send back anyone who can’t involve— 

Chair Paul: Time has expired.

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