South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem (R). Photo: Gage Skidmore
Donald Trump’s presidential cabinet is beginning to take shape, with an outgoing state governor who has repeatedly clashed with tribes potentially poised to join the incoming Republican administration.
In her second term as governor of South Dakota, Kristi Noem accused tribes of harboring dangerous and violent drug cartels operating 1,000 miles away along the U.S. border with Mexico. Her incendiary charge — which lacked supporting evidence — led to her being banned from every reservation in a state where Native people represent nearly 9 percent of the population.
“The Oglala Sioux Tribe wants to go on record as saying that no guns, heroin, or fentanyl are manufactured on Pine Ridge or any other Reservation in the United States!” a press release from President Frank Star Comes Out declared earlier this year.
But going after tribes on public safety isn’t the only time Noem has tried to intrude on Indian Country. During her first term as governor, as the COVID-19 pandemic was taking a disproportionate toll on Native people, she tried to stop from them keeping their communities safe by claiming they could not establish checkpoints on their borders.
Yet with Trump preparing to take office in January following his sweeping victory at the polls this month, Noem could oversee the very same issues of public safety, borders and even some areas of transportation if she is indeed nominated to lead the Department of Homeland Security. An official announcement has not yet been made by the president-elect or his transition team as of Tuesday afternoon.
“President Trump has empowered strong and intelligent women his whole career. When he was in the White House, he let me do my job as Governor,” Noem wrote on social media as she hit the campaign trail numerous times in support of the Republican presidential ticket.
President Trump has empowered strong and intelligent women his whole career. When he was in the White House, he let me do my job as Governor.
I was so honored to share a stage with several strong, intelligent women in Georgia to support @realdonaldTrump tonight.@LaraLeaTrump… pic.twitter.com/NWizEN8scO
— Kristi Noem (@KristiNoem) November 3, 2024
Even before the election, Noem has been known as a close ally of the Republican former president. For the Fourth of July in 2020, she orchestrated a controversial display of fireworks at Mount Rushmore National Memorial in the sacred Black Hills over the objections of tribes from the Sioux Nation, who were promised the land in a treaty broken by the United States.
She tried to repeat the fireworks event in July 2021 but was stopped by the new administration of outgoing President Joe Biden, a Democrat. She even went to court to try to force Secretary Deb Haaland, the first Native person to lead the Department of the Interior, to issue her a permit, but was easily rebuked.
“A fireworks event at the memorial does cause some harm to the federal-tribal relationship that has been frayed through the years,” Judge Roberto A. Lange noted at the time. Noem pursued an appeal but her case “fizzled out” — as a higher court eventually put it.
Despite losing in court, the fireworks fiasco highlighted an even deeper divide that Noem was able to exploit in Washington, D.C. As she tried to stop the Cheyenne River Sioux Tribe from conducting coronavirus checkpoints during Trump’s last year in Oval Office, she found a willing ally not only at the White House but at the Bureau of Indian Affairs, the federal agency with the most trust and treaty responsibilities in Indian Country.
After the Noem complained about the checkpoints directly to Trump, Tara Sweeney — a presidential appointee who was the first Alaska Native person to serve as the Assistant Secretary for Indian Affairs — threatened to cut law enforcement funding to Cheyenne River, according to documents filed in federal court. When that didn’t work, Sweeney tried to amass a group of law enforcement officers to go to the reservation to take control in the weeks before the November 2020 election, Indianz.Com reported at the time.
“We appreciate your concern about preventing the spread of the #COVID19 virus on the Cheyenne River Sioux Reservation,” Chairman Harold Frazier @CRSTChairman says after Governor Kristi Noem offers a “pathway forward” on #Coronavirus checkpoints. @govkristinoem #Sovereignty pic.twitter.com/nywYGN9CXq
— indianz.com (@indianz) May 13, 2020
The dispute set the stage for Noem’s bold assertions about drug cartels in Indian Country, initially in a speech to the South Dakota Legislature in January of this year. After her claims were disputed, she got personal.
“We’ve got some tribal leaders that I believe are personally benefitting from the cartels being here, and that’s why they attack me every day,” Noem said at one of her town halls in March.
As a handful of Indian nations, notably Cheyenne River and Oglala, began to ban her from their reservations, some leaders attempted a more measured approach. President Anthony Reider of the Flandreau Santee Sioux Tribe said he had a “respectful and productive” conversation with Noem in May about her negative comments.
Yet Flandreau decided to bar Noem as well. In a statement, Reider urged the governor to apologize and to “refrain from making future blanket statements that offend the tribes within the boundaries of the State of South Dakota, some of which depend on state services for the needs of their people.”
An apology never came and all nine tribes in South Dakota ended up barring the state’s highest executive from their reservations. She never publicly detailed her claims about cartels and the border but in September she said she supported more law enforcement in Indian Country.
“We talked about how to increase the amount of tribal law enforcement officers coming through our state academy,” Noem recounted of a meeting that she said took place with six tribes.
I had a productive meeting with the Department of the Interior today.
We focused on enhancing public safety and addressing law enforcement needs for South Dakota’s Native American tribes.
I am grateful for the discussion. pic.twitter.com/weUmkpFnii
— Kristi Noem (@KristiNoem) July 17, 2023
Noem also blamed President Biden for supposedly having “consistently underfunded tribal law enforcement.” As with her cartel claim, she did not offer any evidence — the Democratic administration has in fact pushed for more public safety funding in Indian Country but the Republican-controlled U.S. House of Representatives so far has failed to pass an appropriations bill that would help fulfill the federal government’s trust and treaty responsibilities.
“They need to do their part to keep our tribal communities safe, including closing the wide-open Southern Border,” Noem said of the Biden administration.
Noem herself is barred from running for office again due to term limits in South Dakota, although she still has more than a year left in her current term. The next gubernatorial election will take place in November 2025 in a state that hasn’t elected a Democratic governor in five decades.
“This is a really great governor, successful governor,” Trump said of Noem at a campaign rally in Pennsylvania last month.
“She has done a fantastic job as governor,” Trump added.
A #LandBack protest in Keystone, South Dakota, on July 3, 2020. Photo by Willi White, courtesy NDN Collective
So far, Trump has announced his intent to nominate a slew of loyalists for cabinet positions in his upcoming administration. All are Republican politicians who supported his campaign and most were speakers at the Republican National Convention, which took place in Wisconsin in August.
The list of Trump cabinet nominees announce so far include:
Lee Zeldin, Republican member of Congress from New York, to serve as Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency
Elise Stefanik, Republican member of Congress from New York, to serve as U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations
Mike Waltz, Republican member of Congress from Florida, to serve as National Security Advisor
Mike Huckabee, Republican former governor of Arkansas, to serve as U.S. Ambassador to Israel
Trump also has announced other key staff picks, including Susan “Susie” Summerall Wiles, who was his presidential campaign manager, as his chief of staff at the White House.
During his first term in office, Trump notably went through four chiefs of staff, including Mark Meadows, a Republican former member of Congress from North Carolina who was the one who supported Kristi Noem’s efforts to shut down coronavirus checkpoints in Indian Country, according to court documents.
Additionally, Trump announced Tom Homan, a former “acting” director of the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, an agency within the Department of Homeland Security, will serve as his “border czar.” Along with addressing the U.S. borders with Canada and Mexico, Trump said Homan will carry out a key campaign promise.
“I’ve known Tom for a long time, and there is nobody better at policing and controlling our Borders,” Trump said on social media on Monday night. “Likewise, Tom Homan will be in charge of all Deportation of Illegal Aliens back to their Country of Origin.”
