Trump DHS Chief Dealt New Blow as MAGA Turns on Him

The former Oklahoma plumber tapped by Donald Trump to run his mass deportation drive has hit a new blockage as he struggles to get a grip on the program.

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Markwayne Mullin, 49, gave up his Senate seat in March to replace the fired Kristi Noem as the head of Homeland Security, only to find himself up against MAGA big-hitters like Laura Loomer and Steve Bannon who accuse him of being soft on immigration.

The Wall Street Journal reported on Wednesday that commercial carriers are pushing back at ICE enforcement at airports. The agency, which falls under DHS, had been making between 12 and 36 arrests a day at airports, but the tide is turning because airlines, particularly low-cost carrier Southwest, are digging in.

Airlines for America, a trade group representing major U.S. carriers, met with DHS officials late last month to raise their concerns, with a spokeswoman telling the Journal that they want to ensure that “there are proper procedures and protocols in place to prioritize the safety and security of all involved.”

Last summer, the Transportation Security Administration, which is also under the DHS umbrella, began providing passenger manifest data to ICE so it could determine whether there were any potential immigration targets due to fly, insiders told the Journal.

A DHS spokesperson didn’t deny this, saying the department is “simply enforcing our nation’s laws and established policy.”

What has transpired is fear in the terminals. Agents have plucked people from security queues, boarding lines and even from planes.

But the Journal has reviewed documents suggesting that airlines are done with the heavy-handed arrangement. In one example of pushback from July 25, Southwest blocked ICE agents from boarding a plane in Dallas to make an arrest. An insider said there have been at least six similar examples of late, involving only Southwest.

Pressure from above is creating the scene. White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller set the lofty target of 3,000 deportations per day last year, and Noem’s failure to deliver this was part of the reason Trump dumped her.

Mullin, who won a successful family plumbing business before going into politics, promised he would get the numbers up—but reports suggest he’s actually around the same level as his predecessor. Data given to Politico suggests that deportations by ICE have flatlined this year, despite Mullin’s pledge.

An insider familiar with the figures told the publication that the number of deportations has fluctuated, never holding steady and, overall, matching the numbers delivered by Noem’s ill-fated tenure. A Politico source said that the ICE detainee headcount has hovered at roughly 68,000 of late.

That steady figure signals deportations aren’t outpacing new roundups, with agents averaging roughly 1,500 arrests and bookings daily—a step down from a peak of nearly 1,900 a day under Noem.

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The Journal suggests that the quota has been cooled to 2,000 daily arrests.

ICE leaders believe that enforcement at airports has been lacking thus far, hence why operations have intensified, people familiar with the matter told the Journal.

While immigration agents previously targeted people with final deportation orders, ICE is now rounding up immigrants whose visas expired while their applications for green cards or asylum are still pending. Historically, people waiting on pending paperwork were allowed to stay and work in the U.S. without fear of removal—but ICE is now using those expired visas as an excuse to make arrests.

Phil Washington, who retired last week as chief executive of Denver International Airport, said: “I’m worried about escalation—I’m worried about bystanders.”

It’s a development Markwayne Mullin could do without. “Mullin is the wrong guy at the wrong time for the wrong job—a time when we need focus on ‘mass deportations,’ we get an amnesty advocate,” Bannon told Politico’s Playbook on Monday after the DHS boss gave a speech where he appeared to favor legal immigration.

“We want to take care of Americans first. It’s our economy. It’s our homeland, but there’s a way to utilize labor. We’re not having the participation rate we need to, and we can plug those holes,” he said at a National Governors Association event over the weekend.

Bannon, the president’s former chief strategist, wasn’t the only high-profile dissenter. Far-right extremist Laura Loomer, an influential figure in Trump’s ear, openly called for the president to fire Mullin after declaring she is “fed up” with the Homeland Security secretary.

“When we have another 9/11 or Americans are attacked with drones by Islamic communists, Markwayne Muslim is going to be to blame,” Loomer posted on X.

Former Border Patrol commander Gregory Bovino blasted Mullin for boasting there had been “900,000 individuals that have been naturalized” in the U.S. over the past 12 months.

“He celebrates your replacement as long as it’s done legally, without mentioning that 80 % of legal immigrants will vote Democrat,” Bovino posted while referring to the far-right “great replacement” theory. “This is the man running our Department of Homeland Security. And we wonder why we’re going to lose the midterms?”

MAGA podcaster Jake Posobiec told Playbook that there is a “growing wave among MAGA to find a DHS secretary who puts deportations first.”

But the DHS denied Mullin’s head was on the chopping block. A spokesperson said: “We are all focused on delivering on the president’s mission to deport illegal aliens and protect the homeland. Anyone who says otherwise is just trying to sow division and create an illusion of chaos.”

Even the White House came out in his defense. Outgoing Press Secretary Abigail Jackson said that Trump had confidence in Mullin’s ability to “carry out the agenda the American people voted for.”

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