The Senate confirmed Markwayne Mullin as secretary of the Department of Homeland Security late Monday in a 54-45 vote, with two Democrats joining Republicans to push the Oklahoma senator over the finish line. Democratic Sens. John Fetterman of Pennsylvania and Martin Heinrich of New Mexico broke ranks to back President Trump's nominee, while Kentucky Republican Rand Paul cast the only GOP vote against him.
The confirmation hands Mullin control of a department in open turmoil. Routine DHS funding has lapsed since February 14. TSA agents are calling out sick rather than work without pay, and travelers at U.S. airports face long wait times. Mullin replaces Kristi Noem, whom Trump fired amid bipartisan criticism of her management.
That two Senate Democrats would supply critical votes to install a Trump cabinet pick at the center of the border and immigration fight tells you something about the state of the opposition party. The left's leadership couldn't hold its own caucus together on one of the most politically charged nominations of the year.
Fetterman's support was no last-minute surprise. He broke ranks at the committee level last week, casting the decisive vote in an 8-7 tally that advanced Mullin's nomination over Paul's opposition. Without Fetterman, the nomination would have stalled.
The Pennsylvania Democrat framed his vote as practical, not ideological. In a statement last week, Fetterman said:
"In January, I called on the president to fire Noem, and he did. I truly approached the confirmation of my colleague and friend, Senator Mullin, with an open-mind. We need a leader at DHS. We must reopen DHS. My AYE is rooted in a strong committed, constructive working relationship with Senator Mullin for our nation's security."
That language, "We need a leader at DHS. We must reopen DHS.", concedes a point Republicans have been making for weeks. The department cannot function without confirmed leadership, and Democrats' strategy of blanket opposition was leaving agencies like TSA, FEMA, and the Coast Guard twisting in the wind. The New York Post reported that Fetterman cited his constructive working relationship with Mullin and the urgency of reopening DHS as central to his decision.
Fetterman's pattern of bucking his own party is well established. He has publicly accused Democrats of being driven by "Trump Derangement Syndrome" rather than serious governance. His vote on Mullin fits squarely into that track record, and it is earning him enemies on the left. Political scientist Don Moynihan posted on Bluesky that "Fetterman literally giving Mullin the key vote to be appointed will be something I suspect will be an issue if he runs for re-election."
Heinrich's crossover drew less attention but may carry more political risk. The New Mexico Democrat had voted against Noem's confirmation and repeatedly demanded her firing. He has said he will "not vote to give another dollar to ICE until they are committed to the rule of law." And yet he voted to confirm the man who will run ICE's parent agency.
In a statement released Sunday, Heinrich leaned on personal ties. As Newsweek reported, Heinrich said:
"This is going to surprise some people, but I consider Markwayne Mullin a friend. We have a very honest and constructive working relationship. We have authored legislation together, such as the Tribal Buffalo Management Act, and we crafted the Legislative Branch Appropriations bill together this year."
Heinrich also cited New Mexico's unique border terrain as a factor. National Review noted that Heinrich and Fetterman were the only Democrats to join Republicans in advancing the nomination. For a border-state senator, the calculation is straightforward: a functioning DHS matters more than a protest vote.
Still, Heinrich's vote sits uneasily beside his own rhetoric. He backed Senate Democrats' repeated attempts this month to fund TSA, FEMA, and the Coast Guard separately from immigration enforcement, attempts that Senate Republicans blocked. Voting to confirm Trump's DHS chief while demanding ICE be starved of funds is a contradiction his colleagues on both sides will remember.
Mullin inherits a mess. DHS funding lapsed on February 14, and the standoff has dragged on for weeks. TSA agents are working without pay or not showing up at all. Trump ordered ICE agents to bolster airport security during the budget fight, a stopgap that underscored how badly the shutdown was biting.
Democrats conditioned their support for a funding deal on changes to immigration enforcement following the fatal shootings of two U.S. citizens, Alex Pretti and Renee Good, in Minneapolis. They pushed for immigration officers to identify themselves, refrain from enforcement near sensitive locations, wear body cameras, and obtain judge-approved warrants before entering private spaces. Talks stalled after Trump rejected the latest proposal.
Mullin addressed some of those concerns at his confirmation hearing. He said officers would be required to use a judge-signed warrant to enter a home except in rare circumstances. He also pledged to revoke Noem's policy of personally approving contracts over $100,000, a bottleneck that had hampered the department's operations. And he rejected the idea of eliminating FEMA, a proposal that had alarmed lawmakers from disaster-prone states.
His stated goal was blunt: get DHS "off the front page of the news." After months of Noem-era scandals and a funding crisis that has left core agencies crippled, that alone would count as progress.
Rand Paul, who chairs the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, voted against Mullin over concerns about his temperament. The article referenced a 2023 Senate hearing in which Mullin appeared ready to physically fight a witness, and comments from 2017 in which Mullin said he "understood" why Paul's neighbor had physically attacked him. Paul's objection was personal and pointed, but it changed nothing. Breitbart reported that Paul was the sole Republican to oppose the confirmation.
Arizona Democrat Ruben Gallego did not vote. His absence went unexplained in the reporting.
Nevada Democrat Jacky Rosen voted against Mullin and made her objections public on X, calling his "number one priority" pleasing Donald Trump and citing his vote against paying TSA agents during the shutdown. "That's unacceptable," Rosen wrote, "and it's one of the reasons why I voted against him as Secretary of Homeland Security." Her framing, that Mullin is a Trump loyalist first and a manager second, reflects the standard Democratic line. But Fetterman and Heinrich rejected that line, and their votes made the difference.
Mullin's resignation from his Oklahoma Senate seat was announced just before the chamber adjourned Monday night. His letter of resignation will be included in the Congressional Record. Oklahoma Governor Kevin Stitt, a Republican, celebrated the confirmation on X:
"I have every confidence he will bring Oklahoma common sense and a deep commitment to law and order to President Trump's cabinet and to DHS."
Trump tapped Mullin less than three weeks before the vote, a rapid timeline that Just The News noted reflected the urgency of filling the post during the ongoing shutdown. The cloture vote that cleared Mullin's path had already signaled that confirmation was likely, but the final tally confirmed what the committee vote hinted at: enough Democrats were willing to break with their party to seat a Trump nominee at the helm of homeland security.
Mullin posted on X earlier this month that "President Trump ran on restoring law and order, and he quickly delivered the most secure U.S. border in American history. I look forward to supporting @POTUS' mission to safeguard the American people and defend the homeland." Those are campaign-style words. The job ahead is operational: reopen the department, pay the agents, and restore order to an agency that has spent months lurching from crisis to crisis under Noem.
When your opponents start voting for your nominees, it's not because they've changed their minds. It's because the alternative, a leaderless department and unpaid agents, became too embarrassing even for them to defend.
