President-elect Donald Trump’s pick to lead the department responsible for disaster recovery was skeptical about climate change, refused to accept federal climate money and was criticized for her own handling of a natural disaster.
Trump on Tuesday named South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem to head the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees the Federal Emergency Management Agency at a time when damage from extreme weather is spiking. FEMA distributes billions in disaster aid annually and runs the nation’s largest insurer against floods – the most damaging disaster in the US
But Noem has rejected the idea that humans are causing temperatures to rise.
When asked by a reporter in March 2022 whether she believes the climate is changing, Noem responded: “I think the science on this is varied, and it’s not proven to me that what we’re doing is affecting the climate.”
Noem, a Republican, is one of five governors who refused to accept EPA planning grants that the Biden administration offered to each state to address climate pollution.
She is the only governor to withdraw from a new $4 billion Energy Department program that gives states money to distribute to their residents for rebates on energy-efficient home appliances and improvements. South Dakota’s share was $69 million, one of the largest per capita amounts in the country.
“That money would have been available for commercial contractors to install energy-efficient appliances, which would reduce heating and cooling costs for the individuals renting or purchasing these homes,” South Dakota Sen. Linda Duba (D) said Tuesday. .
“We’re trying to bring costs down for individuals, so there was a huge opportunity there,” Duba added.
Ian Fury, a spokesman for Noem, said last year that the governor rejected the rebate money because “federal spending often comes with liabilities, and more of it is often not a good thing.”
Noem rejected the pollution subsidy because “we are focused on solving long-term problems with one-time investments rather than creating new government programs,” Fury said.
Noem also did not claim the bulk of the money FEMA has made available to states through a resiliency project grant program.
FEMA offered each state $3.6 million between 2021 and 2023. South Dakota collected just $1.3 million, FEMA data shows. That’s one of the lowest collection rates of any state.
Noem has also sought minimal funding from a separate FEMA grant program that pays for projects to reduce flood damage, FEMA records show.
She would be the eighth secretary of Homeland Security since the department was created after the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001. Two of them had also been governor: Tom Ridge of Pennsylvania and Janet Napolitano of Arizona.
Noem is expected to focus largely on border and immigration issues if the Senate approves. DHS includes Customs and Border Protection and Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
Noem joined legal attacks on climate programs
Noem’s skepticism about climate change stands in stark contrast to that of DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas and FEMA Administrator Deanne Criswell, both of whom currently serve under President Joe Biden. They have both emphasized the enormous damage caused by the intensification of hurricanes, wildfires and floods, which they link to climate change.
Trump has not yet named a FEMA administrator, which requires Senate confirmation, and will likely wait until he selects his Cabinet and other top officials.
Noem, who has been governor since 2019, was criticized for her response in June to major flooding in southeastern South Dakota due to massive rainfall that overflowed streams, including the Big Sioux River. Some locals criticized Noem for not activating the South Dakota National Guard and flying to Tennessee to attend a Republican fundraiser during the floods.
When reporters asked Noem why she had not deployed the National Guard, she pointed to the cost and said no local officials had requested it, according to South Dakota Searchlight. Fury, the spokesman, said at the time that county emergency managers handle local emergencies and are supported by the state upon request.
“Honestly, she was back and forth out of state when all that rain fell, and her focus should have been right here. She should have canceled all her press and been here because the flooding was significant,” said Duba, the Democratic senator.
A few weeks after the flood, Noem asked Biden to approve federal disaster aid for South Dakota. Biden approved the request and FEMA has given $9.1 million to 1,100 residents for emergency costs and minor home repairs.
Noem has experience with the FEMA disaster system. During her time in office, she submitted 10 requests to the White House for FEMA assistance after natural disasters — five to Biden and five to Trump, who denied one request for insufficient damage. South Dakota has received a total of $142 million in FEMA assistance under her leadership, the organization’s data shows.
In 2023, Noem hired Navigators Global, a Washington lobbying firm, “to ensure that South Dakota gets its fair share of all the tax dollars they send to the federal government,” lobbyist Cesar Conda said at the time.
Noem met with Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack in early 2023. Around the same time, her chief of staff, Mark Miller, met with Mitch Landrieu, then in the White House overseeing implementation of the bipartisan infrastructure bill.
While seeking help from the White House, Noem also attacked some of the Biden administration’s actions on climate change. She joined 15 other Republican governors to protest a move by the Securities and Exchange Commission to require publicly traded companies to disclose their risks from climate change.
“Since climate change models vary dramatically, the idea of evaluating investment risk based on such uncertain variables is inherently subjective and unreliable,” the governors wrote to SEC Chairman Gary Gensler in 2022. The SEC rule is intertwined with litigation.
Noem also joined a lawsuit to stop the Biden administration from putting a price on the “social costs” of carbon emissions, which agencies could use to write stricter climate regulations. The lawsuit was dismissed.
“You’re fired!”
A year after he became governor, Noem gained national attention during the pandemic for his insistence that state and local businesses stay open. She was the only governor to reject Trump’s offer for additional unemployment benefits.
Noem has described the pandemic and the response to it as a life-changing event.
“In 2020, dysfunction turned into dictatorship,” Noem wrote in her autobiography “No Going Back,” published this year.
“The COVID-19 pandemic has changed our country and changed me. It almost killed us, and I’m not talking about a virus. Most of the U.S. population was at high risk of being subdued,” Noem wrote.
“South Dakota,” she boasted, “was the only state in the country that never closed a single business.”
Before that, Noem had little to do with climate issues or disasters as a congressman from 2011 to 2019 and was focused on agriculture and the military.
Noem, who is 52, served in the South Dakota Legislature from 2007 to 2011 and grew up on a farm in the eastern part of the state.
In “Not My First Rodeo,” Noem’s memoir published in 2022, she wrote, “If I had to describe my general political beliefs — and the political beliefs of my entire family and most of my neighbors — in just one word, that would be: respect.”
But Noem expressed a sharper edge in her latest book, “No Going Back.”
Near the end, she lists the actions she would take on her first day as president. They include “close the border” and “build that wall and restore the ‘Made in Mexico’ policy.”
Noem also said she would “hire John Kerry as climate czar just to have the satisfaction of looking him in the eye and saying, ‘You’re fired!’”
A version of this report first appeared in E&E News’ Climatewire. Get access to more comprehensive and in-depth reporting about the energy transition, natural resources, climate change and more in E&E News.
