Tricia McLaughlin, the Department of Homeland Security’s top spokesperson and one of the most visible defenders of the Trump administration’s deportation raids, is leaving the agency in the coming week, the department confirmed.
McLaughlin’s impending exit, comes at one of the most fraught moments in the department’s history. Public support for the administration’s immigration enforcement push has fallen to its lowest point since Trump took office, after a series of violent confrontations in US cities and the fatal shootings of two US citizens – Alex Pretti and Renee Good – by federal immigration officers in Minneapolis.
Those killings are at the center of articles of impeachment filed by House Democrats against Kristi Noem, the US homeland security secretary, , accusing her of violating public trust and obstructing congressional oversight.
The 31-year-old was originally planning to leave her post in December, but stayed on because of the shooting deaths, according to the department. Her departure was first reported by Politico.
Following Good’s killing, she wrote in a DHS press release: “Dangerous criminals – whether they be illegal aliens or US citizens – are assaulting law enforcement and turning their vehicles into weapons to attack law enforcement.”
After Pretti was shot dead, she spun it to the Guardian that he “violently resisted” and officers fired “defensive shots” in return.
McLaughlin also faces separate allegations of financial self-dealing. Federal Communications Commission documents obtained by Public Citizen list her as the DHS point person for a $220m agency advertising campaign, portions of which went to an ad firm run by her husband, Ben Yoho. The alleged conflict is cited explicitly in the impeachment articles against Noem.
Before those controversies came to light, McLaughlin had long been a combative and prominent presence in the DHS press operation, regularly attacking critics of the DHS’s immigration enforcement actions.
In the summer of 2025, she accused Democrats and journalists of using “violent rhetoric” that she said was fueling a rise in assaults on DHS and ICE agents.
McLaughlin served in the first Trump administration at the state department and treasury before becoming political communications director for the Ohio governor, Mike DeWine, and, most recently, senior adviser to Vivek Ramaswamy’s 2024 presidential campaign.
Last month, a former DHS communications official, David Lapan, told the Columbia Journalism Review: “What Tricia McLaughlin is doing at Homeland Security is unlike anything I’ve ever seen in my government service. I’ve never seen it as adversarial as this.”
Her deputy, Lauren Bis, will be promoted to replace her as assistant secretary for public affairs, according to Axios.
Disclaimer : This story is auto aggregated by a computer programme and has not been created or edited by DOWNTHENEWS. Publisher: theguardian.com
