Trump Rips Jerome Powell as Feud Shows No Sign of Cooling Down

Donald Trump said that Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem’s disastrous response to the deadly flooding in Texas was good, actually, because she had been quick to get in front of a camera.

During an interview with NBC’s Kristen Welker, Trump defended Noem over reports that FEMA’s response was delayed by a policy she instituted requiring her to personally sign off on all DHS expenditures exceeding $100,000. FEMA officials, who were unaware of the new rule, didn’t receive Noem’s go-ahead until Monday, at which point floodwaters had been raging for more than 72 hours.

“I don’t know anything about it. We were right on time. We were there,” Trump said. “In fact, she was the first one I saw on television. She was there right from the beginning, and she would not have needed anything. She had the right to do it, but she was literally the first person I saw on television.”

“That morning, when we all woke up and saw this tragedy that took place during the evening. And she was right on the ball. She’s done a great job,” Trump added.

In Trump’s world, it only matters how something looks, not how it actually is. And despite Noem’s sweeping powers, her primary job has always been simply to appear on television with that tremendous blowout.

On Sunday, as rescue teams sprung into action and FEMA scrambled to assemble aid, Noem posted on Instagram asking her followers to vote for their favorite portrait of her to be used as her official governor’s portrait. (It’s worth remembering that as governor of South Dakota, Noem was banned from 20 percent of the land by the state’s nine federally recognized Indigenous tribes.)

The next day, Noem finally got around to signing for Texas’s requests for aerial imagery to help with search and rescue efforts. But oh gee, what portrait did she pick?