Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem is taking heat for another one of her photo ops—this one involving a gun she was inadvertently aiming a law enforcement officer’s head.
In a video posted to X on Monday while working with Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers and Arizona law enforcement, Noem stands between two men while explaining what they’ve been doing.
“Here we are with Marco and Brian today,” she says, with the muzzle pointed in the latter officer’s direction.
“They’re letting me roll with them. We’re going to go out and pick up somebody who I think [has] got charges of human trafficking,” Noem says. “We earlier had an op that swept up somebody that was wanted for murder. So appreciate the good work that they do every day, and we appreciate them working to make America safe.”
The criticism was swift.
Arizona Sen. Ruben Gallego, a lance corporal in the Marines who deployed to Iraq, questioned her decision.
“1. Close your ejection port. 2. If you have no rounds in the chamber why do you have a magazine inserted? 3. If you have rounds in the chamber or in the magazine why are you flagging the guy next to you?” he wrote on X, before calling out her role in the administration’s deportations. “4. Stop deporting people without due process.”
Gallego, a Democrat, later posted a video captioned, “Kristi Noem doesn’t know how to hold a gun or run the Department of Homeland Security.”
The Washington Post’s military reporter Alex Horton, also an Iraq veteran, noted that Noem showed “bad muzzle discipline.”
“Noem is pointing the M4 muzzle at an agent with an open dust cover, indicating a chambered round. It’s the worst possible place to point it,” Horton wrote on X. “No one stopped her, including the agent to her left, who should know better but also has bad muzzle discipline.”
Other responses bashing Noem’s firearm handling came from a variety of sources, including Barstool hosts—“so many things wrong here but let’s start with not pointing the barrel of that rifle at your buddy’s head”—and popular Trump-aligned accounts.
“Why is Kristi Noem holding the g*n right at that agent’s head?” X user Texas Patriot wrote. “I like her, but this tells me she doesn’t know sh*t about g*ns.”
Criticism of the photo-op in general came from the right as well.
“Do we really need Kristi Noem cosplaying as a door-kicker?” podcast host Jesse Kelly asked. “What does this gain us? It’s clownish, unserious, and embarrassing. Everything doesn’t need to be a photo opportunity. Send rough men to get the barbarians and leave this stuff for Broadway. ICE has it covered.”
The Federalist senior editor John Davidson added, “Whatever your politics or views on immigration, I think we can all agree that these photo ops are ridiculous.”
Several critics simultaneously bashed Noem while alluding to her admission that she once shot and killed her puppy.
New Mexico Sen. Martin Heinrich captioned a screenshot of her armed pose: “Kristi Noem preparing to break down the door of your local pet shelter.”
