She has earned the moniker ‘ICE Barbie’ for her official appearances in full glam, and now DHS secretary Kristi Noem is making sure her underlings can’t miss what she’s doing.
Noem, 53, has adorned the walls of agency offices with framed pictures showing her in rough and tough photo-ops.
So, when staff walk the halls of various DHS buildings – where Noem reportedly only spends a few hours a week – they can’t help but see the boss posing up in action shots in photos obtained by DailyMail.com.
In one framed photo of the secretary, sitting proudly on horseback and flanked by U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents, she wears a cowboy hat, jeans and leather boots.
Another photo shows her wearing a helmet and dark shades, riding an ATV while leading agents down a dirt road as she stares into the camera.
There are also shots of her dressed in the forest green border patrol uniform, posing for a smiley group shot in front of the border wall while seemingly strutting through a checkpoint wearing tight blue jeans and a black CBP baseball cap.
The photos now hang in the Ronald Reagan Building, where CBP is headquartered, and in the National Infrastructure Command Center (NCIC) in Washington, D.C., replacing more conventional pictures.
‘All pictures at the NICC and her office area at RRB are being replaced with her dressed up in border patrol gear,’ one source told DailyMail.com.
Insiders tell DailyMail.com that the pictures have become a source of mockery among subordinates who snicker at them.
They see her desire for attention getting in the way of DHS enforcement and serving as a smoke screen to distract from the fact her agency has so far failed to fulfill Trump’s central campaign promise to deport and thwart millions of illegal immigrants.
‘While our brave DHS agents risk their lives to secure our nation, Secretary Kristi Noem treats their mission like a costume party, strutting around in tactical gear for photo ops that insult their sacrifice,’ the source said.
He also took a shot at her special assistant Corey Lewandowski, who has accompanied Noem on trips and was also rumored to be having an affair with her.
‘Her shadow chief of staff, roommate, affair partner, and business adviser Corey Lewandowski should counsel her to respect the badge instead of playing dress-up with it,’ he added.
Another communications official working for a prominent Republican on Capitol Hill told DailyMail.com that he has heard from various DHS staffers complaining about Noem’s vanity.
‘People are calling her ICE Barbie and this kind of fits,’ the source said of the photos.
‘She can’t put out actual statistics of the deportation numbers because the numbers aren’t even close to what was promised. So instead, she’s offering up these photos of her trying to look badass.’
The Wall Street Journal mentioned the existence of the photos in a scathing report published last week about her ‘Made-for-TV Approach to Homeland Security’ which showed how Noem has been focused on messaging as much as action.
The article pointed out how just days after she took office as head of Homeland Security, she joined ICE agents on a predawn raid in New York City and tweeted about it before the raid had even concluded.
Insiders told the outlet that her post potentially alerted targets to the operation and ultimately resulted in fewer arrests than officials had expected.
‘Live this AM from NYC. I’m on it,’ she posted on X at 4:43am on January 28, along with a picture of herself hopping into a vehicle wearing an ICE baseball cap.
Noem introduced herself to her new workforce by walking on stage at a town hall meeting to the country song ‘Hot Mama’, insiders claim.
She has faced mounting criticism for her penchant for documenting and dramatizing the work of her department.
Since then, she’s made a series of changes which have ruffled feathers within the department, from pushing voluntary staff exits to implementing the use of lie detector tests to root out disloyal staff and leakers.
Her antics have become part of her signature style and sparked backlash from other MAGA supporting conservatives.
Within her own department, some reportedly view her as little more than a spokeswoman or ‘face’ of the operation.
More recently, Noem made headlines again after she was robbed in public in a stunning breach of security on Easter Sunday.
Despite having Secret Service protection, Noem’s purse, which contained her driver’s license, passport, badge, makeup, and roughly $3,000 in cash, was stolen from her while she was out dining in a restaurant in Washington D.C.
Trump’s border czar, former acting ICE director Tom Homan, is considered to have more gravitas and expertise than Noem, the former governor of South Dakota.
He himself has indicated that he calls the shots when directing raids and deportation events.
High profile conservatives including Megyn Kelly and Meghan McCain have flamed the DHS secretary for her repeated photos ops in recent weeks.
In one photo-op, Noem stood flanked by two agents during a video touting a recent operation rounding up illegal immigrant criminals in Arizona.
Swiftly, critics noted Noem was pointing the barrel of the weapon towards the head of the man standing on her left.
They also pointed out that her trigger finger was not pointed away from the trigger and how she was wearing her bulletproof vest askew.
‘Just stop trying to glamorize the mission and put yourself in the middle of it as you cosplay ICE agent, which you’re not,’ Kelly said on her podcast earlier this month.
She went on to describe Noem as an ’embarrassment’ over the ‘ridiculous photo ops,’ which she said she couldn’t ‘stand.’
‘I think they diminish ICE, DHS, CPB, she’s not an agent. She is an administrative policy person appointed by Trump because she was very loyal to him.’
Kelly claimed that Noem ‘looks like I look right now, but she’s out in the field with her gun,’ furthering the ‘ICE Barbie’ image, adding she has to ‘stop with the glam’.
‘No one wants you there. First of all, nobody ever wants the extra lady who doesn’t actually belong. They just don’t.’
McCain joined in the conservative pile-on just a day later, adding: ‘I don’t think that it is productive to have a full face of makeup and hair extensions.
‘I’m from Arizona and I’ve been shooting guns since I was a child… she literally could’ve blown that man’s head off, anybody with even a cursory knowledge of gun safety knows that,’ said the daughter of late Senator John McCain.
Noem should be doing her job ‘and not turning it into a social media spectacle,’ she added.
The former co-host of The View added that it is ‘hurting’ Noem and anything that hurts her hurts Trump.
‘I like her. I don’t want her to become a parody of herself.’
In another apparent photo-op, Noem angered liberals for wearing an expensive watch on her wrist while simultaneously berating suspected gangsters at the notorious El Salvador prison where the Trump administration banished illegal migrants.
She posted video to social media where she went face-to-face with men said to be members of the notorious Tren de Aragua gang, who have become a focal point of Trump’s border policy.
After touring the building with Salvadoran Minister of Justice Hector Gustavo, Noem had a message for any would be followers who wanted to cause havoc while in America illegally.
‘First of all, do not come to our country illegally: You will be removed, and you will be prosecuted,’ she said
‘But know that this facility is one of the tools in our toolkit that we will use if you commit crimes against the American people.
The Trump administration sent 261 illegal migrants to El Salvador on March 15 in a move which sparked legal disputes, protests and mass controversy.
In spite of the criticism, the administration’s border policies have delivered some success, with illegal crossings down to the lowest point in decades.
But Trump’s lofty target to hit one million deportations annually is still a far-away dream, with pace needing to rapidly increase.
There have been reports that Trump has expressed frustration in private at the number of deportations and would like to see rapid improvement as he seeks to make good on his promise to solve the crisis at the border.
But Noem, in an interview, would not be drawn on the specifics.
‘We’re not putting numbers on that, because we don’t want to be judged by specific numbers,’ she said.
‘Because we have targeted so harshly the worst of the worst. If we’re just randomly sweeping up people, those numbers would be much higher.’