ICE Barbie Is Now Paranoid Barbie

"Noem has grown so distrustful of agency staff that she has started threatening and even administering polygraph tests to people suspected of leaking," the Wall Street Journal reports.

By Lauren Tousignant | April 15, 2025 | 9:59am

Photo: Getty Images Politics

It’s been a busy three months for Kristi Noem: She’s had photoshoots, traveled across the country to go boating, ATV-ing, and horseback riding, flew a helicopter, dressed up as an ICE agent (cute!), starred in a $200 million commerical, and even made Tiktoks in front of a brutal El Salvador prison. It’s hard to believe that amid all the adventure traveling, social media influencing, and propaganda-ing, she’s had time for her government job as the literal Director of Homeland Security.

Except, according to a new report in the Wall Street Journal, ICE Barbie isn’t really fulfilling her government duties as the head of our country’s multi-billion-dollar counterterrorism department. And her tight appearance schedule means she’s only at DHS headquarters in Washington D.C. for a couple of hours a week.

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Inside the department, some view her as more of a chief spokeswoman than a traditional secretary closely guiding the agency’s direction, according to current and former Homeland Security officials. That perception is bolstered by her schedule: the frequent travel means she only spends a few hours a week physically at the department’s main campus in southeast Washington, D.C., they said, which has irritated many at DHS.

Noem is also allegedly not getting along with Trump’s Border Czar, Tom Homan, who’s in charge of his mass deportation campaign, and Trump’s policy advisor, Stephen Miller, who, when he’s not acting like a baby who lost his pacifier on Fox News, is in charge of immigration policy. She also caught heat when she tried to name 28-year-old Madison Sheahan, who worked on her re-election campaign for governor, as acting ICE director—despite Sheahan having zero law enforcement or immigration experience. Sheahan was ultimately named as the agency’s deputy, according to WSJ.

The report also suggests that between her tension with Homan and Miller and Trump’s reported impatience that half the country hasn’t been deported yet, ICE Barbie has officially become paranoid Barbie:

Noem has grown so distrustful of agency staff that she has started threatening and even administering polygraph tests to people suspected of leaking, including Trump appointees, according to officials familiar with the matter.

On top of wasting government funds on trips and seemingly being ineffective (hey, wasn’t someone supposed to be fixing all that?) Noem’s role as the dolled-up face of deporation is also reportedly fucking with Homeland Security operations. Her “approach,” according to the outlet, is “rankling ICE officials, who grumble that her desire for publicity interfered with the operations of the agency she is in charge of running.”

In January, when U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials went on a raid in New York City, Noem quickly tweeted that she was there, too…which obviously alerted people that a raid was happening. “Though the New York raid went ahead, it resulted in fewer arrests than officials had hoped for, the people familiar with the operation said,” WSJ writes.

Honestly, this is the kind of government incompetence I can get behind. Keep up the shitty work, Noem.