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President Donald Trump invented a senior government role for Kristi Noem to stop her from running for a seat in the Senate this year, administration sources tell PunchUp.
The title of “Special Envoy for the Shield of the Americas”—announced on March 5 by Trump, 79, as he publicly fired Noem from her role as DHS secretary—was effectively fabricated to ensure she missed the filing deadline for the South Dakota Senate race and would thus be unable to challenge incumbent Sen. Mike Rounds, according to multiple sources.
“It was made up to keep her busy,” one source close to the administration told PunchUp of Noem’s new role. The source said the White House’s private view was that Noem had become so toxic it needed to “put her out to the glue factory”—and so invented an opening that kept her on the government payroll and off the ballot, but with no real power.