Kristi Noem went before the part of the job that few Federal Agency and Departrment heaeds tend to like…..
Dealling with their TWO masters….
Getting grilled by the people who authorise their budgets….
And making sure their BOSS , Trump & Co* doesn’t get pissed with their performances…
Noem…A former Governor, got chewed on pretty hard on the Garcia tattoo ….
The Trump administration just became so much more Orwellian.
“The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command,” George Orwell wrote in his cautionary tale about totalitarianism, 1984.
On Wednesday, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem took that command a step further, refusing to even acknowledge a doctored photo depicting alleged gang tattoos on Kilmar Abrego Garcia’s knuckles, which the White House has repeatedly used to justify his deportation.
In a heated back-and-forth with Representative Eric Swalwell during a House Homeland Security Committee hearing, Noem repeatedly swerved away from answering direct questions about the photo, which was displayed on a massive poster board behind the California lawmaker.
Asked several times whether the photo was “doctored or not doctored,” Noem eventually said that she did not “have any knowledge of that photo you’re pointing to.”
But because she apparently refused to look at the image—which, in Swalwell’s photo, was held up by President Donald Trump—Swalwell decided to have one of his aides bring the image to her.
“My question is—the numbers and the letters: MS-13—can you look at the photo, please,” Swalwell said.
“Are you saying Abrego Garcia is not a wife beater? Is not a criminal? Is not a human trafficker?” asked Noem.
“It’s so telling that you won’t look at the photo,” said Swalwell. “Can you look to the right at the photo in front of you?”
“I have seen this photo as you held it behind you,” said Noem.
“The letters M-S and the numbers 13, are those doctored or not?” pressed Swalwell.
“You don’t want to talk about the facts? The importance of our national security?” tossed back Noem.
“Madame Secretary, this is not a hard question. Are those doctored or not? Is that actually on his hand or not?” Swalwell said.
Noem then said it was “unbelievable” to her that Swalwell was so focused on the photo, reiterating that she “did not have any knowledge” of it….
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But Noem did not have an answer for that question. Instead, she repeated accusations that Abrego Garcia—who the Trump administration admitted had been deported as an “administrative error”—was a wife beater and a criminal.
“I’m a former prosecutor. I have put people away for life sentences who are gang members. I don’t need to wear costumes to show how tough I am,” Swalwell said, before yielding back his time. “What makes me different from you is when I put those people away, I did it with the weight of the law behind me.”…
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The Supreme Court ordered the executive branch to “facilitate” Abrego Garcia’s return to the U.S., but the White House has since contested that ruling, arguing that Abrego Garcia “will never live” in America again.
Trump himself appears confused about Abrego Garcia’s connection to Latin American gangs. The president entered into a terse exchange with ABC News in late April when he insisted that the doctored photo of Abrego Garcia’s knuckles was real….
More…
Note….
Noem IS carrying Trump’s Stephen Miller on her back….
Miller who is NOT a Lawyer…
Doesn’t much care for anything except hunting down people undocumented and sometime’s documented …
She also got hit on her ‘Glam’ images at site visits….
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