| | | | BY PHILIP ELLIOTT
Senior Correspondent, TIME | | Markwayne Mullin expressed regret for his rhetorical swipes at slain protesters. He toned down his criticism of so-called sanctuary cities. And he pledged to reverse multiple policies of the administration he looks to join. | It was quite the retreat from the former MMA fighter who once challenged a union chief to a brawl, but Mullin's performance of contrition on Wednesday may not only get him confirmed to lead the embattled Department of Homeland Security—it may finally get the Department reopened and all of its staff back to being paid as normal. | Fourteen months ago, the Senate unanimously voted to confirm Marco Rubio as the freshly inaugurated Donald Trump's Secretary of State. Mullin does not have the same universal respect in his bid to replace fired Homeland chief Kristi Noem, but he appeared to have done at least enough to get over the finish line. | While looking to cast his tenure as a reset for that sprawling—and currently defunded—agency, Mullin pledged to stop the practice of requiring the Secretary personally sign off on any spending over $100,000, a policy that members of both parties say has turned emergency management into an unworkable bottleneck. | "To be very clear: I don't get to choose the laws that I enforce. You guys pass the laws. I enforce those laws," Mullin said in a deferential nod to his colleagues. | As is the case with so much in the Trump era, normalcy was occasionally fleeting and the tempering far from total. | Confronted about his disparaging remarks about slain activist Alex Pretti as a "deranged individual that came in to cause max damage," Mullin refused to apologize but said he regretted using that language. It was a measure of contrition more that he offered Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky, the chairman of the committee overseeing the breakneck-fast confirmation process, who brought up the time Mullin called him a "freakin' snake" and said he understood why Paul's neighbor had physically attacked him. | "I'm not apologizing," said Mullin. That fighter's instinct is how Mullin became one of Trump's best allies in the Senate and a personal friend, and why Paul seemed to imply Mullin's confirmation wouldn't need his support. | | | "This is the fastest hearing anyone's ever had," Paul said toward the end of the session. "This will be the fastest vote anyone's ever had and that's despite my qualms and problems with your nomination." | Paul, who criticized Mullin for his "machismo" and "sheer lack of any kind of self-awareness," said he left the hearing as a no vote, meaning Mullin would need to pick up at least one Democratic vote for his nomination to be sent to the full Senate. That seemed more than likely as Democratic Sen. John Fetterman of Pennsylvania seemed ready to once again disappoint his party's base. | "In this town, you've got to get along and find a way to work together," Fetterman said. | Overall, though, it's clear Mullin is joining a Cabinet on a mission to at least sand down some of the fangs of the first year of Trump's return to power. Republican strategists are warning November's midterms stand to be a bloody verdict as the public has soured on Trump's hardline immigration policies. In a retreat from the current approach, Mullin said he would require federal agents to seek judicial warrants before entering homes or businesses in most cases, and stressed that his goal was to focus on policing immigration cooperatively with local communities—through their jails rather than streets. | Those moves might help pave the way for Democrats and the White House to find an off ramp to the current shutdown that is strangling airport traffic across the country. | | Once an asset to the GOP brand, immigration is now an anchor. "We're in a course correction mode right now," House Speaker Mike Johnson said last week. "We're going to have a new Secretary of Homeland Security." | Indeed, many of the lawmakers posing questions to Mullin seemed to share Senate Majority Leader John Thune's expectations of confirmation. "You'll be Secretary," Democratic Sen. Elissa Slotkin of Michigan said. | First, though, Mullin needed to answer lawmakers' closed-door questions about at least one classified trip abroad. In a senatorial tussle of sorts, lawmakers pressed Mullin on details of an alleged super-secret spy mission, and he said he was one of just a handful of people who knew about it and could say nothing more. Mullin, who has no military or intelligence service on his official resume, said he was on assignment from the government but would not specify which part of it or which foreign nation or nations were involved. | "You have not been forthcoming with me or this committee. The story always seems to evolve, to kind of change, and as you know, candor, honesty, transparency are absolutely critical, particularly at this time, to try to build trust as the Secretary of Homeland Security," said Sen. Gary Peters, who is the top Democrat on the panel. "So we have to clear this up." | Paul said he might delay Thursday's vote if Mullin kept playing coy. "It makes people curious when you say 'Oh, I'm on secret missions for somebody but I won't tell you who,'" Paul told reporters after the public hearing. "And only four people in the world know about this?" | Espionage or intrigue aside, Mullin seemed to express sufficient contrition for what came before, and lawmakers seemed eager to at least be rid of Noem, who became the face of Trump's no-mercy crusade against immigrants in the country illegally. Given the concessions Mullin came prepared to offer, Democrats may be at least willing to take a chance. | "What Secretary Noem did was give the green light to lawless behavior. Are you going to give the green light to lawless behavior?" Sen. Maggie Hassan of New Hampshire asked. | Time and again, Mullin pledged that he would be eager to work with lawmakers any time on any issue—including getting the department back at full budget. (Funding ended on Feb. 14 and scores of feds are working without normal paychecks while Democrats try to secure many of the concessions Mullin offered before the committee.) | "If you call me, you're going to get a response. If you text me, you're going to get a response," Mullin assured his fellow Senators during his hearing. He later added of the session: "Once it's over, I hope we can work together and get 'em funded." | First, he needs their votes. | READ THE STORY » | | | | |
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