Kristi Noem’s recent termination as the U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security raises serious questions as to why she was ever trusted with the role in the first place and why she still has authority in our government.
Although Noem’s tenure will end on March 31, students at the University of Miami and universities across the country will continue to feel the lasting effects on their freedoms due to the unprecedented federal pressure she imposed on higher education.
For example, Noem demanded the records of all foreign students at Harvard University, and when Harvard refused, citing violations of the First and Fourth Amendments as well as statutes governing DHS, she terminated 2.7 million dollars in grants.
When institutions are forced to comply with dangerous demands or risk federal retaliation that could jeopardize their existence, students learn that speaking out comes at a cost too.
From 2024 to 2025, UM’s overall student free speech ranking dropped 41 points, and 51% of students reported self-censoring at least once or twice a month, according to FIRE’s 2026 College Free Speech Rankings study.
The University of Miami’s downward trend in student free speech rankings is consistent with that of most universities and is the inevitable result of leadership that has left campuses and their administrators terrified of undemocratic government overreach.
Beyond Noem’s direct impact on college students, the Department of Homeland Security is meant to serve as the nation’s first line of defense, confronting issues such as terrorism, cybercrime, immigration enforcement and disaster response.
Leading such an agency requires integrity, credibility and constitutional literacy — all of which Noem lacks. Appointing Noem as the U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security was a grossly negligent failure of judgment that endangered the lives of every American citizen.
However, Lazaro Chavez, the president of UM’s College Republicans, thinks that she did a “fine job serving at the pleasure of the president.”
“There were areas where she could’ve been a lot better when it came to immigration enforcement and how she communicated policy to the public, but overall she did a decent job,” he said.
Additionally, Chavez believes Oklahoma Senator Markwayne Mullin, whom President Trump has appointed to succeed Noem, will be more effective.
Fortunately for Senator Mullin, it would be difficult to do worse. Noem bears the responsibility for ICE leading with brutality, barbarity, and impunity during her tenure.
The use of unrecognizable masked agents, unmarked vans and secretive raids has fostered a culture of fear among immigrants residing in the U.S., where families face the persistent threat of random arrest or separation.
In the Florida Everglades, Alligator Alcatraz stood as the literal embodiment of the dehumanized, brutalized enforcement that Noem’s leadership kick-started.
Noem praised the cruel detention facility as “absolutely fantastic” and a potential model for other parts of the country. Numerous Trump administration officials boasted that the detention center was surrounded by alligators if detainees dared try to escape its inhumane conditions.
In Texas, eleven-year-old Jocelyn Rojo-Carranza killed herself after classmates reportedly taunted that her parents would be deported. Noem and her leadership initiated the normalization and acceptance of cruelty against immigrants, so much so that children knew how to exploit the permeating fear as a means to bully.
In Minnesota, while trying to protect an innocent woman who was shoved to the ground and pepper-sprayed by ICE agents, Alex Pretti, a nurse for the Department of Veterans Affairs, became another of the many victims of an agency permitted to disregard constitutional limits and employ excessive force.
While Pretti’s family mourned his murder, Noem publicly labeled him a “domestic terrorist.” In reality, Pretti was combating domestic terrorism, dying a hero as a result of 10 gunshot wounds. Members of Congress asked her to retract her statement or apologize to Pretti’s mother, which she refused to do.
By blatantly disregarding her agency’s duty to operate within the Constitution, Noem helped ensure the deaths of immigrants and Americans, perhaps because she does not understand the very document she is sworn to uphold.
Last May, Noem incorrectly defined habeas corpus, the fundamental right to challenge unlawful detention, as authorizing the president to remove anyone from the United States. This is deeply disturbing for someone who is responsible for overseeing federal detention, particularly when, as a result of her direction, citizens have been unlawfully arrested almost every day and often don’t get the due process the Constitution guarantees.
Exchanges such as this, where the factual basis of the policy in question was apparently unknown to the individual responsible for enforcing it, became an alarmingly routine aspect of her public testimony.
President Trump did not consider firing Noem until criticism from within his own party emerged, despite receiving repeated pleas that she was endangering American lives.
That reality illustrates something deeply disturbing about the state of leadership in Washington today: Protecting American lives and constitutional rights is an afterthought, sacrificed for political loyalty and agenda.
The president’s decision to fire Noem as secretary, followed by the creation of an absurd new position for her, couldn’t exemplify this sentiment any more.