[Congressional Record Volume 172, Number 40 (Tuesday, March 3, 2026)]
[Senate]
[Pages S747-S748]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




     HOUSING FOR THE 21ST CENTURY ACT--Motion to Proceed--Continued

  The PRESIDING OFFICER (Mr. Banks). The Senator from North Carolina.


                              Kristi Noem

  Mr. TILLIS. Mr. President, I come to the floor today to maybe lower 
my own temperature but explain what I was getting at in the Judiciary 
Committee hearing this morning. We had the Secretary of Homeland 
Security Kristi Noem before the committee, and I have not been shy 
about some of my criticism for the Secretary of Homeland Security 
really on two fronts.
  I think I was primarily focused on--what I wanted to focus on was the 
failure, in my opinion, of the FEMA response for Hurricane Helene 
really across the Southeast but particularly in North Carolina, where 
it hit hardest.
  So I went in thinking that I was going to talk a little bit about my 
frustration with Hurricane Helene, but then an hour before the hearing, 
after 30 days when I sent a letter saying I also wanted detailed 
information on Operation so-called Charlotte's Web, which was 
identifying illegally present people and deporting them--I have no 
problem with that, by the way. What I have a problem with is the how. 
But I got basically a ``Dear Sir, Madam, or Small Child: Thank you for 
asking questions we don't intend to answer'' response from the 
Secretary of Homeland Security. That did not make me happy. So I have 
to admit, when I got into the hearing, the heart rate was up a little 
bit.
  What I wanted to do in the hearing was talk about how I apply my 
professional experience to working here in the Senate. I was going to 
give her a performance evaluation for her 14 months on the job, and I 
was going to use as evidence empirical information, stuff that we 
found--hard to get but stuff that we got.
  This is a graphic of three different hurricane responses. Trump 1 had 
Florence and Matthew, devastating storms in North Carolina. You can see 
here--anytime you are in business, when you see outlays and 
expenditures kind of flat, that means an organization is doing a good 
job. In other words, we knew what the damage was, we had the money for 
it, they requested the reimbursement, and they got it. That is what 
competent disaster management looks like.
  Under Secretary Noem and Helene--a $59 billion impact in North 
Carolina--that is what incompetence looks like. You can see the huge 
difference between obligations and outlays.
  Well, let's just translate this into human terms in North Carolina. 
That means a county that can't even balance its budget, Yancey County, 
one of the hardest hit--they are just looking for basic reimbursements 
now, and the Secretary has decided that every reimbursement in excess 
of $100,000 has to go across her desk before it is approved. That is 
almost unheard of. It may be a violation of the law in terms of the 
Homeland Security Act of 2002, but it is certainly in violation of 
common sense.
  If you want to do a quick back-of-the-napkin--do the math--divide 
100,000 into 59 billion. That is a lot of numbers, right? A lot of 
approvals. Really? The Homeland Security Secretary wants $100,000 
increments for people who are suffering in Western North Carolina to be 
subject to her approval? That is what produces garbage like this. That 
is what gets people fired in the private sector, where I spent the 
majority of my career before I joined the State legislature in 2006.
  So on the disaster recovery front, Secretary Noem has failed 
miserably, by empirical standards. Nothing personal. It could be my 
mother in this position. I would have to fire my beloved mom. At the 
end of the day, this is horrible performance. And why it is horrible--
these are not only facts and figures; these are people's lives, and she 
has decided paperwork and redtape are more important than flooding the 
zone and giving them money for removing debris, money for actual 
temporary housing, money for buyouts--the basic sorts of things you 
have to do.
  But I was only going to talk briefly about that. I wanted to talk 
more about the main subject in Judiciary, and that was the response for 
these deportations. I am angry with Secretary Noem because she has 
taken away one of the most important issues that Republicans won 
elections on in 2024. The border was wide open. Millions of people were 
coming across the border. We didn't know who they were. There were an 
estimated 1.7 million so-called ``got-aways.'' These are people who pay 
a premium to the cartels to go through a section of the border where 
they can escape detection. They even give them carpet to put under 
their shoes so they can't be traced. These are not angels. These are 
people that are paying cartels a premium to come across the border. The 
other people just simply come to a border crossing, present themselves, 
and they can seek asylum. Bad people, all right? I get that. They 
should be apprehended, incarcerated, or deported.
  I simply asked 30 days ago: Of the 500 encounters in Charlotte, could 
you give me your data on it--anonymized? I don't want the specific 
people unless they want to come forward. I want to know: If you had an 
interaction with somebody, were they illegally present? were they a 
U.S. citizen? did you detain them? did you destroy their property in 
the process of detaining somebody briefly and come to find out--
whoopsie--they have been a U.S. citizen for 20 years?
  That is important performance information. That is called a job 
performance assessment. Why can't I get that for the 500 or so 
encounters in Charlotte, a town that is 20 minutes from where I live?
  Then I get a letter an hour before the hearing saying: No, that is 
confidential information.
  Then she has the audacity to come to a hearing and say they are a 
top-notch, professional law enforcement organization. There is not a 
law enforcement organization in the United States of America that 
couldn't answer that question for me.

  So which one is it? Have you failed to keep track of all these 
encounters or are you refusing to provide it to me because you are 
concerned with the results--that the minority of the people you are 
probably detaining are the ones who are bad people that should be 
detained, deported, or incarcerated? I just want to know what the 
success rate is. And she refused to answer that question.

[[Page S748]]

  So I announced in the hearing today that, similar to what I had to do 
to get the Homeland Security Secretary to even come before the 
committee--I had to put a hold on any sorts of nominations that went 
through Homeland Security. Maybe it had an influence. Maybe other 
pressures got her there. But now she is not answering my questions.
  So, effective today, I will refuse to allow any en bloc nominations 
to go through this Senate floor until I get my questions answered--
effective today. Effective on March 19, I will block any nomination, 
any markup of legislation that goes before Finance, Banking, Judiciary, 
or Veterans' Affairs. I will block my own nominations until I get the 
answer to the question--and every other one that goes through that--
because my vote is necessary in any partisan votes to get it out of the 
committees.
  I want answers to questions. That is what you give to a U.S. Senator. 
You don't treat us like some sort of person that you just placate in a 
committee and go on and do other things. I have the election 
certificate. I have people in North Carolina that want answers, and I 
want answers. If I don't get them, we are simply going to shut down the 
noms process until we can get somebody to answer my question.
  Now, the questions I am not going to cover that have to do with the 
encounters--that is delineated in the letter. But these are five other 
questions that I want answered, and they go like this--because I want 
them in the Federal Register, and I will submit a document so the 
transcription is accurate. These are my five questions:
  The Homeland Security Act of 2002 expressly prohibits the Secretary 
of Homeland Security from restricting or diverting FEMA resources from 
the Agency's mission. Based on your disaster response, I have reason to 
believe that she is violating the law, either knowingly or unknowingly, 
so I want to know what the total amount of FEMA reimbursements are that 
are currently being held by DHS for final approval to be spent by FEMA. 
I want the exact dollar figures, and I want a full list of the 
recipients.
  Based on recent reports, I have reason to believe that DHS has 
delegated responsibilities of the FEMA Administrator to an outside 
contractor, who is Kara Voorhies. What is her official role in DHS? 
That is my second question.
  My third question: Special government employees, SGEs, are prohibited 
by law from working more than 130 days during any 365-day period. How 
many days has Corey Lewandowski worked over the last year, and how many 
days does he currently have left under the SGE status?
  No 4: Why does Corey Lewandowski have final signoff authority on 
internal DHS routing documents--these are internal routing documents--
above the Deputy Secretary--a part-time, unpaid person--above a Deputy 
Secretary before documents are submitted to the Homeland Security 
Secretary for approval?
  No. 5: Based on an unclassified letter submitted to Congress 
yesterday by the DHS Office of Inspector General--these are the people 
that keep us honest; they are a very important part of the role--I have 
reason to believe that the Secretary and the Department are obstructing 
at least one criminal investigation.
  Not my words; these are the words of the Office of Inspector General, 
who published a letter yesterday. That is almost unheard of. Do you 
have any idea how bad it has to be for someone embedded in a Department 
to publish a letter about the obstruction of the Secretary of that 
Department? That is bad, folks.
  So I want the Secretary to answer the question: Do you believe that 
restricting or delaying the inspector general's access to documents, 
systems, and witnesses reflects a direct violation of Federal law?
  The OIG thinks she does, so I want to know.
  Mr. President, I know we are 2 minutes away from going into recess, 
and I am not going to extend time.
  The bottom line: This Secretary has done our President an injustice 
by some of the most incompetent execution I have had the displeasure to 
witness over the last 11 years and 2 months that I have been a U.S. 
Senator. It bears no resemblance to Trump 1 in terms of Homeland 
Security and in terms of FEMA response.
  I am a Republican. I support this President. I believe deporting 
people illegally present here is critically important to our future. 
But I also believe you have to be able to execute, you have to be able 
to do your job, you have to be able to be responsible, and when you 
make a mistake, you admit it and move on. This Secretary has done none 
of that, and so I will be doing none of nominating and confirming and 
markups until such time as I get an answer to these critical 
questions--or her resignation or the answer to the question, whichever 
comes first.

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