Up First from NPR - Trump Fires Kristi Noem, Middle East War Latest, Venezuela-US Diplomacy

Episode Date: March 6, 2026

President Trump fired Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem and named Senator Markwayne Mullin as his pick to take over, in the first cabinet shakeup of his second term.The U.S.-Israeli war with Iran is widening again, with Israel striking Beirut’s southern suburbs as Lebanon says tens of thousands have been displaced.And two months after U.S. forces seized Venezuela’s president, Washington and Caracas are suddenly cutting deals on oil and critical minerals and moving to restore diplomatic relations.Want more analysis of the most important news of the day, plus a little fun? Subscribe to the Up First newsletter.Today’s episode of Up First was edited by Anna Yukhananov, Hannah Bloch, Tara Neill, Mohamad ElBardicy and Alice Woelfle.It was produced by Ziad Buchh and Nia Dumas.Our director is Christopher Thomas.We get engineering support from Neisha Heinis. Our technical director is Carleigh Strange.Our Executive Producer is Jay Shaylor.(0:00) Introduction(01:53) Trump Fires Kristi Noem(05:50) Middle East War Latest(09:44) Venezuela-US DiplomacyTo manage podcast ad preferences, review the links below:See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

Support for NPR and the following message come from the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, investing in creative thinkers and problem solvers who help people, communities, and the planet flourish. More information is available at Hewlett.org. President Trump tries new leadership at the Department of Homeland Security. Christy Noem oversaw an operation that killed two Americans in Minnesota. She lost her job when lawmakers questioned her spending on ads that promoted her. I'm Michelle Martin. That's Stevenskiy, and this is up first from NPR News. The U.S.-Israeli war with Iran is widening. Israel ordered residents to flee the southern suburbs of Beirut.

Israelis described the area as a stronghold of Hezbollah. Our correspondent saw roads choked with people fleeing before bombs fell on their neighborhoods. And two months after U.S. forces seized Venezuela's president, the two countries are cutting deals. What is Washington won from Caracas? Stay with us. We've got the news you need to start your day. Support for NPR and the following message come from the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, investing in creative thinkers and problem solvers who help people, communities, and the planet flourish. More information is available at Hewlett.org. President Trump has fired his Homeland Security Secretary.

Christine O. became the public face of the administration's mass deportations project. Now she is a casualty in the first cabinet shakeup of Trump's second term. The president announced her firing in a truth social post. post on Thursday and said Mark Wayne Mullen, a senator from Oklahoma, would replace her. Let's talk this through with NPR immigration policy correspondent Hima Bistillo. Hema, good morning. Good morning. How'd this come about?

Well, we didn't know Trump would fire her, but during two congressional hearings before the House and Senate Judiciary Committees this week, I did notice that both Republicans and Democrats had questions about her leadership, including how efficiently the agency distributed disaster relief funds and what she had been. spending her agency's money on. One of the most notable moments came during questions from GOP Senator John Kennedy of Louisiana. He asked Nome about a multi-million dollar immigration-related ad campaign that she ran last year. The contract for the ads went to a firm that was created just days before.

And according to reporting from investigative news outlet ProPublica, one of the beneficiaries was connected with the husband of former DHS spokesperson Trisha McLaughlin. Now, NPR has not independently confirmed that reporting, but Kennedy did ask Nome if President Trump had asked her to run these ads. And Nome said and basically confirmed that Trump was okay with it. Kennedy's questioning was interesting because he asserted that this contract was for hundreds of millions of dollars and that they basically promoted Nome rather than administration policy, that they were promotional ads for her and done by a company with political connections to her. Although it strikes me that that was her most prominent job, was being the face of immigration enforcement. Right. She was featured in many promotional social media videos, including standing in places like El Salvador's notorious prison, Seco, and on the front lines of many individual immigration arrests themselves. And she always defended the actions of the agency, but that backfired after events in Minnesota.

If you remember, two U.S. citizens were killed by immigration officers there back in January. and after the death of one of them, Alex Preti, Noam was quick to label him a domestic terrorist. This individual who came with weapons and ammunition to stop a law enforcement operation of federal law enforcement officers committed an act of domestic terrorism. That's the facts.

Now that language, although used before, drew immediate bipartisan scrutiny in this case. Okay, so she's out. We haven't even gone through all the different controversies involving her, and she is to be replaced by Mark Wayne Mullen, United States Senator from Oklahoma. When would he start? Trump says that Mullen takes over by the end of March, although, of course, he does need to get confirmed by the Senate to officially take on the post. Here's Mullen speaking to reporters on Capitol

Hill after the announcement. I am super excited about this opportunity. It came at a, not a complete surprise, but it came at a little bit of surprise for us. And so the president and I, as you guys know, we're great friends, and we get along great. I look forward to working with him in his cabinet. of course, we still got to build this little thing called confirmation. One of his first tasks will be due to address the lack of trust in immigration enforcement, which was a big theme this week during those hearings. Where does the agency stand overall? The agency is now in its third week without funding,

which means hundreds of thousands of employees are furloughed or working without pay. Now, zooming out, Trump won his election in part due to promises to clamp down on border security. But in the wake of Minnesota, nearly two-thirds of Americans say immigration and customs enforcement has gone too far. That's according to a poll from NPR, PBS News, and Marist last month. Still, immigration enforcement continues to be a top issue for the president and for Democrats as we enter the midterm cycle. NPR's Sameda Bistillo, thanks as always. Thank you. Israeli forces struck a suburb of Lebanon's capital overnight. Beirut is a city of millions of people now, shaking from bombs and filled with evacuees. Israel ordered residents to flee a southern

suburb that it describes as a stronghold of Hezbollah. That group had responded to the U.S. and Israeli attack on Iran. NPR's Hidal al-Shalchi is in Beirut with a report. Hi there, Hadil. Good morning. What's it like where you've been in the last 24 hours? Well, it was quiet early this morning, but the Israeli military just announced that it is still striking the Dahi neighborhood. It's really actually not that far from downtown Beirut, close to where I am, just about four miles away. And the Lebanese government says that the death toll has now gone up to 100 people since the war with Iran began. Now, Steve, I was out reporting last night right before the strikes yesterday. And roads, which are normally not busy at that time of night, were gridlocked.

Israel had issued an evacuation order for the entire southern suburb. And families were fleeing in trucks. You know, the back of them were stuffed with blankets, kitchen products. You know, they stuffed their kids back there too. And then Beirut itself is just crowded with the displaced. You know, those with money are able to afford hotels or rent apartments. I found it hard to find a hotel room myself before coming here because they're so full. But then those who can't afford hotels are sleeping in their cars. And on the streets, the sidewalks are packed here with displaced families. Mothers and children huddled under blankets to stay warm,

men sitting around little fires to keep warm, also smoking cigarettes. And Lebanese officials say over 95,000 people are now displaced. And some of those people from the south have had to evacuate their homes multiple times. Wow. I want to understand how we got here. So the U.S.

and Israel struck Iran last weekend. Hezbollah in southern Lebanon is allied with Iran. They fired upon Israel. The Israelis fired back. And then how did we get from that initial exchange

of fire to this mass evacuation? So you have to remember that Israel's actually been striking in southern Lebanon and what it's calling Hezbollah installations for the past 15 months already, even though there was a ceasefire

brokered last year. But then it just ramped it up after, like you said, Hezbollah launched rockets into northern Israel earlier this week. Now, the Iran-backed Lebanese militant group first said this was in solidarity with Iran, and then it backtracked it and said the rockets were because of ongoing Israeli attacks. But this is still the first time Hezbollah launched rockets into Israel in those 15 months. And so now we're seeing the Lebanese government is really trying to distance itself from Hezbollah and from Iran. Earlier in the day, I sat with Lebanon's justice minister, Adam Nassar,

He instructed the Lebanese security authorities to issue arrest warrants for the Hezbollah members who launched those rockets into Israel this week, which is kind of unprecedented. The Assad wants to dismantle Hezbollah's military wing. There is a move now in Lebanon to do that. Hasbela's military wing operates mainly out of southern Lebanon. But look, Hezbollah still enjoys popularity in Lebanon. But I'm hearing more and more people here say that they've dragged them into an unnecessary war. And so Nassar says there are huge challenges. How does this fit into other developments in the war?

Well, earlier this morning in Tehran, there was heavy bombardment in the city center near the Supreme Leader's old home. Fighter jets flew overhead. There were huge explosions. And then in the Gulf, Qatar's defense ministry said it thwarted a drone attack at the biggest U.S. military facility in the Middle East. And in Bahrain, the government said two hotels and a residential building were targeted by Iranian strikes. In Israel, it was quieter than previous nights with no incoming missile attacks. and the military's chief of staff there said last night that the U.S. and Israel are working in what he called a, quote, historic cooperation.

And Biersodil al-S. Shelchi in Beirut, thanks so much. You're very welcome. This network sends correspondence to get a firsthand view of events. And today we have a report from inside Venezuela. Two months ago, U.S. forces swooped into Caracas and seized Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro and his wife. Since then, the relationship between the U.S. and Venezuela, seems to be on a very fast mend.

The two countries have made oil deals. They're now talking critical minerals and have agreed to reestablish diplomatic relations. NPR's Ader Peralta is in the country. Hey there, Ader. Hey, good morning, Steve. What's it feel like to be in Venezuela? It is absolutely surreal

because you land at the airport and the signs are in Spanish, Russian, Arabic, and Chinese, which tells you just where this country was facing a few months ago. And then you go out on the streets and people here tell you that they feel like a weight has been lifted.

For the first time, in a long time, there are street protests, opposition groups are holding public meetings. I was at the Justice Department building yesterday, and there was a group of protesters calling for all political prisoners to be released. Venezuela has passed an amnesty law, but it excluded anyone who called for a foreign intervention. And I met Edward Okaris there, and he's a former political prisoner. He has faced the wrath of this government. But then right there, in public, he taunts.

the government. They call us traitors, he said, but look at them now. So they're those who not are not going to the U.S. Now it's them who are not only kneeling, he's saying, but sleeping with the United States. And to be clear, he thinks the U.S. intervention was regrettable, but he also thinks that something good came out of it, and that allows him to say this in public without being thrown back in prison.

Is that the only point of view you've been hearing? No, I mean, yesterday was also the 13th anniversary of the death of former President Hugo Chavez. And so hundreds of people came to pay their respects at his burial ground. And in the middle of this crowd was this guy playing the guitar. And he is singing Yankee Go Home. It was pure defiance at Chavez's tomb, but of course this is happening at O. almost the exact time that Chavez's own party was sitting at the presidential palace cutting deals with U.S. officials. Wow. It is just fascinating to hear, I guess I should say, the different points of view out on the streets.

This is just remarkable an explosion of opinions in this repressed country. And the American Secretary of the Interior is visiting. How's that going? I suppose it could have been awkward because Interior Secretary Doug Berman sat for a meeting right in front of Venezuelan Interior Secretary of Dios Dado Covello Covello. and that is the man who is wanted in the U.S. for narco-terrorism. In fact, they're still offering $25 million for his capture. But what we saw instead were lots of smiles. Bergam ignored questions about Cabeo or democracy, and he made clear that this is about business.

The interim Venezuelan government has passed laws that make it easier for U.S. oil companies to do business here, and Bergam says that they're about to do the same for the mining sector. And he explained the real politics at play here. One of the highest strategic national security threats to any democratic nation right now is China's control of critical minerals. And those are the minerals in your laptop, for example. And he says Venezuela likely has those minerals. American companies would like to extract them.

And Venezuela could suddenly become key in helping the U.S. break reliance on China. A win-win, he called it. And yesterday, Trump said, quote, Venezuela is working. once again, he was framing it as the model for regime change. Okay, NPR's Ada Peralta reporting from Caracas, Venezuela, with sounds on the streets. Thanks. Thank you, Steve. Just a reminder to follow us wherever you get your podcasts, and in addition to the daily news,

you get the Sunday story on the up-first podcast from NPR. This weekend, you hear about an open secret in India. Women are selling their eggs illegally for IVF. This is just about providing a part of your... your body to another person, and once that will work, they will have the babies. We get to hear the story from one of our great storytellers, NPR correspondent Dia Hadid, investigating the black market for human eggs in India. She also meets women who are selling their eggs to survive.

And that's a first for this Friday, March 6th. I'm Steve Inskeep. And I'm Michelle Martin. Today's episode of Up First was edited by Anna Yucananoff, Hannah Block, Tara Neal, Mohammed El Bardisi and Alice Wolfley. It was produced by Zia Bucch and Nia Dumas. Our director is Christopher Thomas. We get engineering support from Zoe Van Genhoven.

Our technical director is Carly Strange. Our executive producer is Jay Shaler, and we hope you'll join us again on Monday. Support for NPR and the following message come from the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation. Investing in creative thinkers and problem solvers who help people, communities, and the planet flourish. More information is available at Hewlett.org.