Firm Tied to Kristi Noem Secretly Got Money From $220 Million DHS Ad Contracts

Source: ProPublica

The company is run by the husband of Noem’s chief DHS spokesperson and has personal and business ties to Noem and her aides. DHS invoked the “emergency” at the border to skirt competitive bidding rules for the taxpayer-funded campaign.

On Oct. 2, the second day of the government shutdown, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem arrived at Mount Rushmore to shoot a television ad. Sitting on horseback in chaps and a cowboy hat, Noem addressed the camera with a stern message for immigrants: “Break our laws, we’ll punish you.”

Noem has hailed the more than $200 million, taxpayer-funded ad campaign as a crucial tool to stem illegal immigration. Her agency invoked the “national emergency” at the border as it awarded contracts for the campaign, bypassing the normal competitive bidding process designed to prevent waste and corruption.

The Department of Homeland Security has kept at least one beneficiary of the nine-figure ad deal a secret, records and interviews show: a Republican consulting firm with longstanding personal and business ties to Noem and her senior aides at DHS. The company running the Mount Rushmore shoot, called the Strategy Group, does not appear on public documents about the contract. The main recipient listed on the contracts is a mysterious Delaware company, which was created days before the deal was finalized.

No firm has closer ties to Noem’s political operation than the Strategy Group. It played a central role in her 2022 South Dakota gubernatorial campaign. Corey Lewandowski, her top adviser at DHS, has worked extensively with the firm. And the company’s CEO is married to Noem’s chief spokesperson at DHS, Tricia McLaughlin.

Read more: https://www.propublica.org/article/kristi-noem-dhs-ad-campaign-strategy-group

Worth 1,000 words. This picture is so revealing about so much about this “administration.”

Step back five feet from the dram of any photo about any Trump action or policy, and you’ll see the boom arms, the rigging, the floodlights…

— David Waldman (@kagrox.bsky.social) 2025-11-14T13:10:11.324Z

Everything you need to know about the Trump “administration” and Trump World. Just step back five paces and look again.

— David Waldman (@kagrox.bsky.social) 2025-11-14T13:13:08.799Z