Trump ally bringing his immigration policies to DHS

Sen. Markwayne Mullin does not sit on any committees with direct authority over immigration or the Department of Homeland Security. But his record on the issues the high-profile agency handles signals that he will bring a hardline approach to his new role atop the department.

In recent months, Mullin, an Oklahoma Republican who President Donald Trump nominated last week to take the reins at DHS, has waded into the controversial waters of the White House‘s immigration policies. Trump announced Mullin as his pick concurrently with saying Kristi Noem would exit the position, becoming the first cabinet secretary of the president’s second term to leave.

He called Alex Pretti, the ICU nurse killed by federal immigration agents earlier this year, a “deranged individual.” He co-sponsored legislation after the killing of Renee Good at the hands of an Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent that would increase penalties against people who resist or assault law enforcement officers with vehicles. And he has expressed skepticism about birthright citizenship, a constitutional right that Trump has tried to end.

“I think he’s no-nonsense,” Lora Ries, director of the Border Security and Immigration Center at the Heritage Foundation, said in an interview. “It’s going to be about the mission for him. It won’t be about himself.”

Nomination hearings for Mullin are expected to start as soon as next Wednesday. If confirmed by his Senate peers, he will replace Noem, who had a controversial tenure at DHS, which includes ICE, Customs and Border Protection and the Federal Emergency Management Agency, among other subagencies.

Unless there is a breakthrough in negotiations in the coming weeks, Mullin would also be ascending to the top of an agency in the midst of a government shutdown. DHS funding lapsed Feb. 14 and Democrats have repeatedly voted against bills to restore its funding, citing concerns about the agency’s immigration enforcement practices.

Based on Mullin’s support for hard-charging immigration policies and his close ties to Trump, Democrats do not anticipate any major breakthroughs for their agenda with Noem out.

“He’s given no indication that he plans the kind of reforms that the American people are demanding,” said Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Conn., a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee. “I have hope that he’ll rethink some of his positions as we go through the confirmation process. But I have no factual basis for hope.”

Mullin has not yet laid out detailed plans for his time atop the department, and he will have to first get through a multiweek confirmation process with his Senate…