Two of the most senior Democrats in Congress want the Department of Justice to pursue criminal charges against former Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, accusing her of lying under oath during oversight hearings earlier this month.
Rep. Jamie Raskin of Maryland and Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois, the top Democrats on the House and Senate Judiciary Committees, respectively, sent a letter to the DOJ on Monday laying out what they describe as four categories of false statements Noem allegedly made during back-to-back congressional hearings. The topics include court orders, Corey Lewandowski's role in DHS contracts, whether immigration enforcement has detained U.S. citizens, and the contracting process behind a $220 million ad campaign.
Making false statements to Congress is classified as a felony, carrying up to five years in prison and a maximum fine of $250,000.
A DHS spokesperson responded bluntly to Fox News Digital:
"Any claim that Secretary Noem committed perjury is categorically FALSE."
The sharpest exchange in Noem's testimony centered on a $220 million advertising campaign. Noem told the panel that the contract went through a competitive process and that career officials at DHS selected the firms involved. Sen. John Kennedy, a Republican from Louisiana who sits on the Appropriations Committee, pushed back directly:
"It's something we have to defend. I'm on the Appropriations Committee. I mean, my research shows that you did not bid them out."
Kennedy went further, alleging that the group receiving most of the money had direct ties to former DHS spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin and her husband, Benjamin Yoho, who runs the company in question. Noem also stated that President Trump knew about the ad campaign, a claim Trump himself contradicted in an interview with Reuters.
Yoho denied using his wife's position to secure government contracts. On Friday, he wrote a letter to Senate Democrats disputing the characterization:
"This statement is factually incorrect, and I respectfully request that you have your colleague correct the official record and issue an apology."
In their letter, Raskin and Durbin acknowledged that Noem may have been telling the truth about Trump's knowledge of the campaign. But they argued the contracting claim was indefensible regardless:
"Even if Secretary Noem was the one telling the truth about the President's knowledge, and she may well have been, she flatly misrepresented that the contract had been subject to a competitive bid."
The timing of this referral tells you everything you need to know about its purpose. Noem has already been ousted from DHS. Trump announced earlier this month that she would no longer serve as secretary and would instead take on a new role as special envoy to the Shield of the Americas. Sen. Markwayne Mullin of Oklahoma has been nominated to take over the department, with a confirmation hearing expected this week.
So Democrats are asking the DOJ to pursue criminal charges against a former cabinet secretary who has already been removed from the position in question. The letter doesn't arrive in the middle of a crisis. It arrives after the administration has already acted.
Raskin and Durbin seem to understand the odds of their referral going anywhere. Their own letter contains a remarkable tell:
"While we have low expectations that you will pursue this matter given your partisan weaponization of the Department of Justice, we note that the statute of limitations for perjury and for knowingly and willfully making false statements to Congress is five years."
Read that again. They admit they don't expect the DOJ to act. They preemptively accuse the Justice Department of partisanship. And they cite a five-year statute of limitations, planting a flag for some future administration to pick up the case. This is not a serious criminal referral. It is a press release with a legal letterhead.
Congressional oversight is a legitimate and necessary function. When cabinet officials testify before Congress, they are obligated to tell the truth. If Noem made false statements about the contracting process, that matters. Kennedy, a Republican, pressed her on precisely that point and did not accept her answers at face value. That is how oversight is supposed to work.
But there is a difference between genuine accountability and political stagecraft. Raskin and Durbin described Noem's testimony as a "brazen attempt to undermine critical congressional oversight," framing their letter in the grandest possible terms:
"After months of evading our Committees' requests to testify in routine oversight hearings, Secretary Noem made a series of demonstrably false statements in a brazen attempt to undermine critical congressional oversight of the Department of Homeland Security."
These are the same Democrats who spent years shielding DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas from any meaningful scrutiny over a border crisis that saw record illegal crossings. The sudden devotion to congressional oversight of the Department of Homeland Security is convenient. Where was this energy when the department was actively facilitating illegal immigration on an industrial scale?
The pattern is familiar. Democrats treat congressional hearings as opportunities to generate referrals, not to gather information. The referral becomes the headline. The headline becomes the narrative. Whether the DOJ acts is beside the point. The accusation is the product.
The substantive questions around the $220 million ad campaign deserve answers. If contracts were awarded without competitive bidding, that is a spending accountability issue that Republicans and Democrats alike should pursue. Kennedy was right to press on it. The connections between DHS personnel and contracting beneficiaries warrant scrutiny regardless of which party controls the department.
But those questions will be answered through the normal oversight process and through the transition to new DHS leadership under Mullin, not through a criminal referral that its own authors admit is unlikely to be pursued. The administration has already moved Noem out. The confirmation process for her replacement begins this week.
Democrats filed this letter because they could, not because they expect it to accomplish anything. The five-year statute of limitations citation is the quiet part out loud. This is about keeping a talking point alive, not about justice.
The machinery of government has already turned the page. Raskin and Durbin are still writing the last chapter.
