Trump picks Kristi Noem to serve as Homeland Security Secretary

WASHINGTON (CNN) – President-elect Donald Trump has selected South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem as his next secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, according to two people familiar with the selection.

Noem will be tapped to take over the agency as two key immigration hardliners — Stephen Miller and Tom Homan — are slated to serve in senior roles, signaling Trump is serious about his promise to crack down on his immigration pledges. With his selection of Noem, Trump is ensuring a loyalist will head an agency he prioritizes and that is key to his domestic agenda.

Noem, who previously was a South Dakota representative, will now be tasked with overseeing a sprawling agency that oversees everything from US Customs and Border Protection and Immigration and Customs Enforcement to the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the US Secret Service.

Although Noem does not represent a border state, she has a long history of taking hardline positions on immigration. As a candidate for Congress in 2010, she supported an ultimately unsuccessful attempt by Senate Republicans to thwart an Obama administration lawsuit challenging an Arizona immigration law. She also has called for punishment of Democratic-led “sanctuary cities” that protected undocumented immigrants by not cooperating with federal agencies during Trump’s first term.

As governor, Noem sparred with indigenous tribes in her state, suggesting that tribal leaders were focusing more on benefiting from drug cartels than their children, comments that led to her being banned from some tribal lands.

As DHS secretary, Noem would be in charge of a department that is involved in tribal issues.