Former DHS secretary says agency’s 'credibility' is in crisis

When then-President Barack Obama nominated centrist Democrat Janet Napolitano for secretary of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS), he not only liked her national security/law enforcement credentials — he also liked her ability to work closely with Republicans in Arizona, where she served as a federal prosecutor for the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) before she was state attorney general and, after that, governor. Arizona has evolved into a swing state in recent years, but for a long time, it was a red state that was closely identified with the conservatism of the late Sen. John McCain and his political mentor, Sen. Barry Goldwater — who was decidedly right-wing in his views yet commanded respect from many Democrats because of his intense disdain for the Religious Right. And Napolitano worked with a lot of McCain/Goldwater Republicans.

These days, Napolitano, now 68, works in academia at the University of California, Berkeley. And during an interview with Politico's Jonathan Martin published on February 2, she offered a scathing critique of a Donald Trump loyalist who now holds a position she once held: DHS Secretary Kristi Noem.

Napolitano didn't hold back during the interview, arguing that DHS' "credibility" is suffering greatly under Noem and President Trump.

The former DHS secretary was vehemently critical of the Trump Administration's immigration crackdown in Minneapolis, which she said is suffering from a "lack of real guidance" and poor "planning and coordination."

"I mean, the problem they were there to solve was they wanted to pick up undocumented individuals living in the Minneapolis Twin Cities area," Napolitano told Martin. "But the way they went about it was so contra best practices in any law enforcement operation that they created this mess…. One of the issues here is that in the press, everything is conflated as being ICE (U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement). But Border Patrol had a big presence here, and, you know, Border Patrol are trained differently. They're trained for operation at ports of entry, and it's a different use of force policy. It is a different method of training."

Napolitano continued, "It's a different environment totally. And I noticed (Dan) Bovino himself came from the Border Patrol. He was acting like just a cowboy."

Asked if Noem had "reached out to" her at all, Napolitano said, "No."

"We need something…. to really focus agents on the fact that they are federal law enforcement," Napolitano told Martin. "They carry a badge, and there are requirements that go along with that."

Read Politico's full interview with former Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano at this link.