The senator set to replace Kristi Noem as Homeland Security secretary was once accused of “middle school” behavior on a trip with fellow lawmakers.
Oklahoma Republican Markwayne Mullin, 48, has received President Donald Trump’s blessing to succeed the ever-embattled Noem, 54, as DHS chief—immediately setting off a trail of resurfaced stories and allegations about his behavior.
In 2015, when Mullin was a congressman representing Oklahoma’s second district, he went on an AIPAC-sponsored foreign policy trip to Israel with about 40 other lawmakers and their spouses, including then-Michigan Rep. David Trott and his wife Kathleen.
Kathleen alleges that Mullin stuck his finger up other attendees’ noses as they slept, which infuriated some of the women on the trip.
Mullin’s behavior on that trip apparently left such a mark on the couple that they recounted their experience of traveling with him in an interview with Politico eight years later.
Kathleen said their flight to Israel was hampered by layovers and delays that left the group exhausted by the time they got on a bus to see an Iron Dome installation and a kibbutz.
“We were in the clothes we’d been wearing for like 24 hours,” she told Politico. “We get on this bus, and it’s a couple-hour bus ride and people were kind of leaning on their spouse’s shoulder and falling asleep. And this idiot starts walking up and down the bus with his camera and anyone who fell asleep, he would put his finger in their nose and take a picture.”
“I said [to myself, ‘If] that idiot comes near me when I fall asleep, I’m going to punch him,’” she continued. “And I said to Dave: ‘This is a U.S. congressman?’”
The bizarre prank left some people mad and sent others laughing, according to Kathleen.
“There were a couple of women who were mad,” she told the outlet. “You’re trying to fall asleep, somebody you don’t know has his finger … It was just middle school. And we were in Israel, and we’re going to go see the Iron Dome and go to a kibbutz. Just didn’t seem appropriate.”
Mullin’s communications director did not immediately return a request for comment from the Daily Beast on Thursday.
Several other stories about Mullin came back to the fore after Trump’s decision to fire Noem.
In 2023, a Senate hearing nearly devolved into a brawl after Mullin launched personal attacks at Sean O’Brien, the president of the Teamsters, the fourth-largest labor union in the country, with whom he had a long-running feud.
O’Brien made an X post that read, “Greedy CEO who pretends like he’s self made. In reality, just a clown & fraud. Always has been, always will be. Quit the tough guy act in these senate hearings. You know where to find me. Anyplace, Anytime cowboy. #LittleManSyndrome.”
Mullin read the post aloud in the chamber and immediately challenged O’Brien to settle their differences then and there.
“So this is the time, this is the place,” he said. “If you want to run your mouth, we can be two consenting adults. We can finish it here.”
O’Brien responded that he’d “love to do it right now,” prompting Mullin to get up—and Sen. Bernie Sanders to intervene.
Mullin is expected to sit down for confirmation hearings before the Senate Homeland Security Committee, headed by Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul. Just last month, Mullin dubbed Paul a “freaking snake.” Mullin also said that he sided with Paul’s neighbor in a 2017 lawn dispute that left Paul with lifelong injuries.
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