Famously, evil never rests. And over the weekend, the Senate and the Trump administration hastily confirmed then swore in Trump’s first official cabinet members: the unsettlingly thirsty warhawk Marco Rubio as Secretary of State, alleged rapist and alcoholic Pete Hegseth as Defense Secretary, and self-avowed dog murderer Kristi Noem as Secretary of Homeland Security.
The Senate unanimously confirmed Rubio on the same day Trump was inaugurated. Meanwhile, Hegseth was confirmed late Friday by a 51-50 margin that required a tie-breaking vote from Vice President JD Vance. (To put salt in the wound, we are governed by a vice president so uncool that he celebrated the occasion by tweeting a laugh-cry emoji. Heartbreaking, honestly.) Three Republican senators—Mitch McConnell, Susan Collins, and Lisa Murkowski—all voted against Hegseth’s confirmation.
To be clear, these three deserve no congratulations. Instead, we should question why 51 of the most powerful people in the nation saw fit to confirm a man with an alleged history of showing up drunk to every job he’s held in the last decade, and who faces credible allegations of rape and domestic violence, to run the $850 billion Defense Department. Women serving in the military now have to answer to a man who rejects the idea of them in combat roles, and has previously been accused of fostering egregiously sexist work environments—surely that background will help address endemic sexual violence in the military!
Noem was also confirmed on Friday by a 59-34 margin, receiving votes from seven Senate Democrats: Tim Kaine (???) of Virginia, Maggie Hassan and Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire, Elissa Slotkin and Gary Peters of Michigan, Andy Kim of New Jersey, and John Fetterman of Pennsylvania. Shame on all of them. Mind you, this is a woman who is banned from every reservation in her state of South Dakota for her incredibly racist smears baselessly claiming every Indigenous community in the state is effectively a drug cartel. Noem spent her confirmation hearing dehumanizing immigrants and fearmongering about the made-up threat of federally funded gender-affirming care for undocumented incarcerated people (I repeat: ???).
Noem couldn’t even trouble herself to arrive at her swearing-in on time over the weekend. She reportedly showed up so late that Vance left, so she instead had to take the oath with Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. In a social media post, Noem attempted to spin this—being sworn in by Thomas instead of Vance—as a high honor and not the consequence of her own tardiness. The occasion “was made even more meaningful by being sworn in by Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas at his home,” she wrote, taking a page from Trump on the campaign trail and happily throwing Vance under the bus. You almost have to laugh!
I guess our only real hope is that the spectacular incompetence of the new administration—Noem showing up too late to do her job, or perhaps Hegseth getting too drunk to show up to work at all—will stop them from getting anything done. Or better yet, that an asteroid will crash into the Earth. What a hopeful and exciting time to be alive!
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Still here. Still without airbrushing. Still with teeth.
