President Donald Trump fired Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem this week — but quickly tapped her for a new diplomatic role tied to a major Western Hemisphere summit he is hosting this weekend in Florida.
Noem is set to serve as special envoy for the “Shield of the Americas,” a newly created position that raises questions about how the outgoing secretary will fit into the White House’s broader foreign policy team. The dynamics will be on display Saturday when Trump hosts 12 Latin American nations at his golf resort in Doral, Florida, to establish a multinational alliance. Noem will be in attendance.
“He will have a big agreement that I’ll be there with him on Saturday with the Department of War and the Department of State on how we’re going to go after cartels and drug trafficking in the entire Western Hemisphere,” Noem said while delivering the keynote address at the Sergeants’ Benevolent Association Major Cities Conference on Thursday minutes after being fired.
The summit will establish a new security initiative to counter Chinese influence in the Western Hemisphere. Each delegation is expected to sign the flagship Doral Charter, affirming the right of nations in the Western Hemisphere to chart their destiny free from interference.
The summit is an extension of the Donroe Doctrine, to restore American preeminence in the Western Hemisphere, a White House spokeswoman told the Washington Examiner. The concept is a twist on the 1823 Monroe Doctrine, which declared the Western Hemisphere closed to European colonization.
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“The President has successfully strengthened our relationships in our own backyard to make the entire region safer and more stable, and this weekend’s ‘Shield of the Americas’ Summit will encapsulate all of his work to Make America, and our partners, Strong Again,” said White House spokeswoman Anna Kelly.
But Noem’s sudden shift from leading the Department of Homeland Security to serving as a special envoy has left questions about how much authority she will wield within the administration’s Western Hemisphere strategy.
In response to the Washington Examiner‘s additional questioning about what Noem’s role in Doral will entail, the White House defended the secretary’s record.
“Secretary Noem helped usher in the most secure border in history, deported hundreds of thousands of criminal illegal aliens, and executed record-setting counter-drug operations against cartels,” spokeswoman Olivia Wales said. “All of this great experience positions Noem well to ensure American preeminence in the entire Western Hemisphere in her new role as Special Envoy to the Shield of the Americas.”
The White House did not explain how the relationship with Rubio and Noem will work, and who will take charge of the Western Hemisphere alliance. But White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt told Fox News on Friday that Noem will “oversee the new Shield of Americas” to prohibit “cartel trafficking, human trafficking, and drug trafficking in the Western Hemisphere.”
“There’s a lot that we don’t know about the role and how exactly it’s going to fit within the State Department’s larger team,” said Cooper Smith, director of communications and adviser to the Center for Homeland Security and Immigration at the America First Policy Institute.
“But ultimately, her tenure at the department did have remarkable successes in terms of border security, apprehensions at the border, zero people being released for nine months in a row, historic number of deportations,” Smith said in defense of Noem’s credentials to serve as a special envoy.
Philip Brenner, a professor emeritus at American University who studies U.S.-Latin American relations, warned that Noem’s title is a consolation prize that indicates a lack of seriousness about the multinational alliance.
“The question is whether she’s going to be the principal interlocutor for this summit, or whether the president himself will be much engaged,” Brenner said. “If she’s the principal, nothing will get accomplished in terms of U.S. interests, because they won’t trust that she has the president’s ear. She’s obviously lost favor with the president. She is not someone who respects Latin Americans, so appointing her is really quite an incredible step of disregard for the people who are coming.”
Noem was fired this week after a series of mishaps forced Trump’s hand. The final straw came this week after Noem told lawmakers during a congressional hearing that Trump approved of a $220 million DHS ad campaign. “I wasn’t thrilled with it. I spent less money than that to become president,” Trump told NBC News in an interview about the campaign.
Javier A. Hernández, a political analyst specializing in Caribbean history and author of PREXIT: Forging Puerto Rico’s Path to Sovereignty, claimed that the special envoy position is not a consolation prize or demotion. He said the position was one that could be helpful to tackling international challenges such as narco-trafficking, maritime trafficking routes, and border security.
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“Creating a position dedicated to hemispheric security cooperation reflects growing recognition
that numerous threats in the Americas are transnational,” he said. “Ambassador-level leadership will be crucial for this effort. I hope the initiative receives the necessary resources and a capable team, including professionals with extensive diplomatic experience and language skills, enabling them to collaborate effectively with partners across Latin America and the Caribbean.”
Whether Noem will stick around in the role of special envoy remains to be seen. The filing deadline to run for either House or Senate in her home state of South Dakota is March 31.
“She has an opportunity to break down the internal stovepipes, work with our partners in the region and get after the threats that everyone wants to see diminished for the safety and security, not just in the United States, but of the entire hemisphere,” said Peter J. Brown a senior fellow for Western Hemisphere security at the America First Policy Institute.
