Sen. Markwayne Mullin will face his Senate colleagues Wednesday to make the case why he should trade one title for another. 

But after his predecessor, Homeland Security Sec. Kristi Noem, became the first Cabinet official to lose her job in the second Trump administration, Mullin will have to strike a careful balance — showing how he’ll bring a different approach while continuing the same hardline mission.

He’ll make that case in a similar committee room to the one where Noem’s tenure began to unravel, as the Department of Homeland Security remains shut down and under scrutiny for two fatal shootings in Minneapolis at the hands of immigration officers — incidents that sparked protests and raised questions about the agency’s tactics.

Which is why lawmakers have some questions.

Not all the questions will be hostile. Many Republicans are already primed to vote for a man who’s earned himself a reputation as both a savvy operator on Capitol Hill and as a political brawler on the Sunday shows. On immigration itself, Mullin has been full-throated in his support for the administration’s moves. And after the shooting of Renee Good in early January, he defended the incident as “justified.”

“If you don’t want to be in harm’s way, don’t get in the way of police officers from doing their job,” he said.

For some Noem detractors, though, a change in leadership may be enough to win their approval.

“I did not feel that the management that she demonstrated as secretary met the moment,” Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, told reporters Tuesday about Noem.

“I have expressed my confidence in Sen. Mullin,” she continued. “I’ve worked with him for a while now. He’s pretty conservative, he’s pretty full-in on the president’s agenda — which is what the president would expect — but I think he’s a guy who reads very carefully not only the temperature of the Congress and what can and cannot happen, but I also think he’s connected to what people back home are saying. And I think that needs to be relayed to folks in the White House.”

Asked if there’s anything she’d explicitly want to see him change at DHS, she simply said: “more engagement with the Congress.”

Other Republicans say they plan to press Mullin on specifics — both during Wednesday’s hearing and in private meetings ahead of a floor vote.

Their concerns range from the flow of disaster relief funds to scrutiny of recent Immigration and Customs Enforcement operations, including enforcement surges in North Carolina and Minnesota. They also want to know how Mullin would communicate with lawmakers if they approve him dropping the “Sen.” for “Sec.” 

Sen. John Kennedy, R-La. — who helped oust Noem from office with a tough line of questions about a $200 million taxpayer funded ad campaign during her last hearing on the Hill — said Tuesday that he’s “hoping that he’ll promise not to make a bunch of television ads with him on a horse.” 

Kennedy said he expects to tune in to a “lively” hearing Wednesday.

“I want to hear what Markwayne’s thoughts are with respect to FEMA,” Kennedy said, adding he wants Mullin to outline a plan for “getting money to those areas of our country that have been struck by disaster.”

Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., another Noem critic, similarly said he expects Mullin to “have a transformative impact on FEMA.”

Tillis also wants details on Operation Charlotte’s Web, a controversial operation that produced a surge of ICE agents to Tillis’ home state, which resulted in the detention of U.S. citizens. Mullin should come clean about the operation in order to have a clean slate, Tillis said.

“The truth will set us free, and it’ll give Markwayne a great, clean platform to do great stuff,” Tillis told reporters last week. “And I think that he will.”

What might help set Mullin’s nomination itself free is that at least one Democrat — Sen. John Fetterman, D-Pa. — is willing to cross party lines for the man he calls “a good dude.”

”Noem was a hot mess,” Fetterman told MS NOW. “And she’s gone. Now, it’s like someone you could work with is a serious upgrade for a lot of different reasons.”

Pressed on whether Mullin should have to engage with one of Noem’s highest profile moments of misinformation — baselessly labeling the two Americans shot by immigration officers in Minneapolis “domestic terrorists” — Fetterman declined to get into private conversations. But, he said, “I haven’t met anyone at this point that would ever want to ever have another tragedy like in Minneapolis.”

Most other Democrats, however, remain deeply skeptical.

“Having a new secretary would be an opportunity to reset for ICE,” Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., told MS NOW Tuesday, “but the basic question is still there: is the person in charge willing to let ICE do whatever they want?”

She added that Mullin had given “no indication that he wants to change a single thing at ICE.”

Hanging over the hearing is another subplot.

Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., is the chairman of the committee that Mullin will go before on Wednesday — and Paul and Mullin have been in a bit of an open feud for years.

In 2017, after a dispute with a neighbor turned physical and left Paul with broken ribs and lifelong symptoms, Mullin sided with the neighbor. 

Just months ago, Mullin called Paul “a freaking snake.” 

Asked for his thoughts on Mullin ahead of the hearing, Paul simply told MS NOW: “Watch the hearing.”

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