Advertisement

SKIP ADVERTISEMENT

Homeland Security Pick Defends Her Experience Amid Democrats’ Questions

Kirstjen Nielsen, President Trump’s nominee to lead the Department of Homeland Security, was pressed by Senate Democrats during her confirmation hearing on Wednesday.Credit...Al Drago for The New York Times

WASHINGTON — Senate Democrats pressed Kirstjen Nielsen, President Trump’s pick to lead the Department of Homeland Security, during her confirmation hearing on Wednesday about her inexperience and how she would carry out his immigration agenda.

But she faced a mostly deferential Senate Homeland Security Committee, a sign that she is likely to be easily confirmed as the sixth person to lead the agency.

Ms. Nielsen pledged to be tough on border security but acknowledged that Mr. Trump’s campaign promise to build a wall across the entire southern border was unrealistic.

“There is no need for a wall from sea to shining sea,” she said, adding that, as the secretary, she would push for technological solutions and consult the Border Patrol and other agencies about where a wall made sense.

Ms. Nielsen would be the permanent replacement for John F. Kelly, who was homeland security secretary until he left in July to serve as the White House chief of staff. Elaine C. Duke, his deputy, has held the post in the interim. Ms. Nielsen was Mr. Kelly’s top aide at the Department of Homeland Security, and he brought her to the White House to serve as deputy chief of staff.

The harshest lines of questioning Ms. Nielsen faced at Wednesday’s hearing came from Democrats. Senator Thomas Carper of Delaware asked Ms. Nielsen about her lack of experience leading a department that employs 240,000 people and is responsible for border and aviation security, counterterrorism, immigration and recovery from natural disasters.

Ms. Nielsen replied that although she had never led a large organization, she was up to the task.

“Many of the leadership skills that have brought me to this point are scalable,” she said.

Senator Gary C. Peters, Democrat of Michigan, asked whether Ms. Nielsen agreed with Mr. Trump’s comments this summer that “both sides” were responsible for the violence during counterprotests of white nationalists in Charlottesville, Va.

Ms. Nielsen declined to directly answer but said she “disavowed any form of violence” and would work with state and local law enforcement to counter extremists.

Senator Kamala Harris, Democrat of California and a critic of Trump administration homeland security policy, sought a commitment from Ms. Nielsen that she would protect the recipients of an Obama-era program that shields from deportation young undocumented immigrants brought to the United States illegally. Mr. Trump ended the program, which affects about 800,000 young adults, and asked Congress to pass a replacement before he begins phasing out its protections in six months.

Ms. Nielsen pledged that this would not be an enforcement priority for Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the agency responsible for deportation.

Ms. Nielsen briefly clashed with Senator Maggie Hassan, Democrat of New Hampshire, who accused the nominee of refusing to say that humans are the dominant cause of the global rise in temperature. Ms. Nielsen said the federal government should adjust its modeling and preparation for dealing with weather events related to climate changes, but she declined to address the human contributions to those changes.

If confirmed, Ms. Nielsen, who once worked at the Transportation Security Administration, would be the first former employee to lead the agency. She also served on President George W. Bush’s homeland security council, devising a national response plan for domestic events and helping to compile a report on lessons from the bungled federal response to Hurricane Katrina.

Mr. Kelly pushed hard for her selection, making a personal appeal to Mr. Trump during a monthslong search for a replacement. A bipartisan group of former homeland security officials has also endorsed her nomination, including two former secretaries of the department, Tom Ridge and Michael Chertoff, both Republicans who served under Mr. Bush.

“Ms. Nielsen has been engaged in counterterrorism, all-hazard risk mitigation, critical infrastructure protection and response policy from the earliest days of what we now know as homeland security,” they wrote in a letter to the Senate Homeland Security Committee.

But some experts say they have concerns.

John D. Cohen, the former acting undersecretary for intelligence and former senior counterterrorism adviser, said that law enforcement officials have expressed concerns about Ms. Nielsen’s lack of operational experience.

“She has never had executive management experience and she may not have a lot of experience in dealing with domestic law enforcement and terrorism issues,” Mr. Cohen said.

Eileen Sullivan contributed reporting.

Get politics and Washington news updates via Facebook, Twitter and the Morning Briefing newsletter.

A version of this article appears in print on  , Section A, Page 13 of the New York edition with the headline: Homeland Security Nominee Addresses Borders and Experience in Senate Hearings. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe

Advertisement

SKIP ADVERTISEMENT