DHS’s Endless Trolling

Hello, it’s the weekend. This is The Weekender ☕️

In the early weeks of the Trump administration, DHS started a media campaign. It would feature Secretary Kristi Noem, the former North Dakota governor eager to wear the uniforms and gear of ICE, the Coast Guard, and DHS’s other constituent agencies as she staged seemingly perpetual TV hits.

The campaign’s aim was clear: spread the word about efforts to Make America Safe Again. The administration’s worst immigrant-related civil liberties violations were also in service of a larger message: to scare people away.

The campaign debuted in the spring, and showed undocumented immigrants who had been accused of various violent crimes; clips of detainees at El Salvador’s CECOT played in them as Noem thundered: “President Trump and I have a clear message to those in our country illegally: LEAVE NOW. If you do not self-deport, we will hunt you down, arrest you, and deport you.”

It combined true crime, scare tactics, and slick advertising techniques, partly to tell undocumented immigrants to leave, and partly to burnish Noem’s image with atrocities like CECOT. The campaign came together in a way befitting a Trumpworld project. There’s little divide between what it’s doing to promote the agency’s work and to attack the GOP’s partisan opponents. DHS spent around $200 million on the campaign, federal contracting records show. One contract went to a Louisiana firm called People Who Think LLC, run by Jay Connaughton, a political consultant who worked with Noem aide and friend Corey Lewandowski on a 2023 campaign. Another contract went to a firm called Safe America Media; incorporated only a few days before the no-bid solicitation and registered at a property belonging to another GOP consultant.

It’s not clear how much of an impact, if any, these ads had. But compared to what DHS is doing now, that effort looks well thought out and highbrow.

Over the past few weeks, DHS’s X account has alternated between posting about Hunter Biden, memes celebrating settler expansion into the western United States, and more standard fare (assailing all undocumented immigrants as criminals or taunting them upon arrest).

The settler meme was the most shocking: it featured a famous 1872 painting depicting Manifest Destiny called American Progress. It shows Native Americans fleeing groups of white settlers moving by covered wagon. The painting was created as the U.S. continued to fight wars to displace and destroy the remaining Native American tribes. Some users argued that DHS’s caption to the photo — “A Heritage to be proud of, a Homeland worth Defending” — was a deeper dog whistle.

I’m struck here not only by how strange it is for the U.S. government to adopt this painting in the 21st century. It’s the kind of ironic edginess that really resonates: it’s what you post if endless internet cynicism has poisoned your brain. The difference is that we’re not living in a world where this is only a messaging strategy; incidents like CECOT show that the same trollish impulse is driving reality as well.

— Josh Kovensky

Here’s what else TPM has on tap this weekend:

• House Republicans apparently believe there is more to be investigated about the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol — and, presumably, how it wasn’t really Trump’s fault.
• This week brought a return to a vintage, petty Trump scandal from his first term: Sharpiegate.
• The DOJ shot back at what one official called “absurd” speculation that Attorney General Pam Bondi pulled out of a CPAC event due to the ongoing Jeffrey Epstein drama.

Let’s dig in.

— Nicole Lafond

Guy Who Led Jan 5 Tour Group Says There’s More to Investigate About Jan 6

Rep. Barry Loudermilk (R-GA) introduced a resolution on Wednesday to establish a new select subcommittee to continue investigating — as House Republicans are putting it — “the events surrounding January 6, 2021.”

The resolution will have to get approved by the House but if it does Loudermilk will chair the subcommittee, which will be housed under the House Judiciary Committee.

Unless you have been living under a rock in the past couple of years, you know that the Jan. 6 attack has already been investigated extensively by Congress and the Justice Department, even leading to President Donald Trump being indicted for his alleged role in inciting the attack.

But, according to House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA), who put out a statement applauding the resolution, “there is clearly more work to be done” on the issue.

“The resolution introduced today will establish this Select Subcommittee so we can continue our efforts to uncover the full truth that is owed to the American people,” Johnson said.

Loudermilk, you may recall, came under scrutiny while the House Jan. 6 subcommittee was conducting its investigation because the panel surfaced footage of the congressman, on Jan. 5, 2021, giving a tour of the Capitol complex to a group of visitors, at least one of whom ended up participating in the riots the next day. Past investigative efforts by Loudermilk and congressional Republicans have focused on shifting blame away from Trump for the violence and toward “security failures” that allowed his supporters to storm in.

It’s quite the timing for the House GOP to push for another investigation into the events surrounding the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol by a mob of Trump supporters. You’ll recall that Johnson shut down the legislative session to go on recess early this week as the caucus was coming apart amid their internal battle over the Epstein files. Hard not to think that this may be a distraction to get the MAGA allies, who have been calling for the files to be released, focused on something else — a different conspiracy theory, perhaps.

The House is expected to consider the subcommittee resolution when members are back from the lengthy August recess.

— Emine Yücel

Retribution: Sharpiegate Edition 🙄

President Trump and his administration officials have apparently acted on one of his most petty grievances — one that’s been simmering in his mind, occupying it rent free since 2019, towards the end of his first term.

You may recall Sharpiegate, truly the dumbest scandal from Trump I if you don’t count the time he got upset that people were bothered that he was throwing paper towels at hurricane relief workers in Puerto Rico. In short: during the 2019 hurricane season Trump went to some insane lengths to cover up the fact that he didn’t know what he was talking about with a hurricane’s path. When mentioning states that might be impacted by Hurricane Dorian’s approach to the mainland, Trump incorrectly included Alabama as one of the states that would be hit by the storm. It was known by that point that Alabama was not in Dorian’s path and the state weather bureau ended up releasing a statement to correct the president.

Trump couldn’t handle that, so he made a bunch of public remarks insisting he was correct and, at one point, he showed a weather map to journalists in the Oval Office that had been altered with a Sharpie marker to make it seem like the hurricane would actually hit Alabama.

Flash forward to this week: two high ranking officials at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration were placed on administrative leave, according to CNN, which cited anonymous former and current NOAA officials. The two officials put on leave were Steve Volz and Jeff Dillen, who led an investigation into whether NOAA’s scientific integrity policies were broken when Neil Jacob, then-acting NOAA administrator, endorsed Trump’s version of the storm path. The two found that Jacob, who has been nominated to be NOAA administrator this term, had violated the policy. Per CNN:

“It’s an interesting coincidence that less than a week before Neil Jacob’s senate committee vote, the two dedicated career civil servants who investigated him for scientific integrity violations around Sharpiegate were dismissed from service,” one former NOAA official told CNN.

— Nicole Lafond

DOJ Dismisses ‘Absurd’ Speculation About Pam Bondi’s Absence From CPAC Human Trafficking Event

The Department of Justice has provided further detail about Attorney General Pam Bondi’s absence at an event earlier this week. 

Bondi was scheduled to participate in CPAC’s International Summit Against Human Trafficking on Wednesday. She bowed out due to what she described as a “recently torn cornea.” That move made headlines, prompted speculation, and inspired mocking television segments amid the ongoing controversy surrounding the DOJ and President Donald Trump’s handling of files related to the late financier and convicted sex offender Jeffrey Epstein. 

A DOJ official who discussed the matter with TPM called that speculation that Bondi was ducking the issue “absurd,” and said Bondi was actually at a federal medical center. 

“It’s absurd to suggest that the AG had to skip Wednesday’s human trafficking event — an issue the AG has devoted her entire career to fighting — for any reason other than her torn cornea,” said the official. “The AG was at a doctor’s appointment at Walter Reed.”

Bondi did participate in another event that same morning, a swearing in ceremony for DEA Administrator Terry Cole. The official said Bondi “immediately” went to Walter Reed following the swearing in ceremony

Bondi was replaced at the CPAC event by associate attorney general Matthew Galeotti, who read a note from the attorney general explaining her absence. 

“I’m sorry to miss all of my CPAC friends today. … Unfortunately, I am recovering from a recently torn cornea, which is preventing me from being with you. I truly wish I was able to join you and support all of the work being done on this critical issue,” Bondi said in the note, adding, “I look forward to the next time I can be with you. Sincerely, Pam.”

The attorney general’s conspicuous exit from the human trafficking summit attracted considerable attention because she has been a central figure in the drama surrounding Epstein, a financier who was close with Trump in the 1990s and 2000s. 

The CPAC event is in keeping with the far right’s extended fixation on child sex abuse. That focus has included conspiracy theories such as QAnon along with legitimate law enforcement efforts. 

Epstein has been a figure of immense interest to both QAnon and MAGA types concerned about trafficking and child abuse. In recent weeks, many on the right have raged at Trump and Bondi for their handling of records related to the Epstein case. The financier was convicted in 2008 of paying underage girls for sex. He died in 2019 while in jail on subsequent sex trafficking charges. 

Over the years, as Trump has winked and noddedat QAnon types, the president, who has downplayed his own relationship with Epstein and denied engaging in any wrongdoing, suggested there would be major revelations from the case. Those hints from Trump and his administration included Bondi declaring Epstein’s list was “sitting on my desk right now to review” during a February interview. Earlier this month, the DOJ contradicted those comments when it announced that an investigation concluded that Epstein killed himself and there was no evidence that a list existed. That claim has led to a revolt in MAGA circles including the House GOP.

— Hunter Walker