The Senate has voted to confirm Markwayne Mullin, the senator from Oklahoma, as the new secretary of the Department of Homeland Security. The upper chamber voted to confirm Mullin 54 to 45 on Monday evening. Two Democrats, Sens. John Fetterman, D-Pa., and Martin Heinrich, D-N.M., joined 52 Republicans by voting in favor of President Donald Trump’s nominee to lead DHS. Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., was the lone Republican to vote “no.” Paul is the chairman of the Senate Homeland Security Committee and had previously made his objections to Mullin’s nomination known at the committee’s confirmation hearing. Sen. Ruben Gallego, D-Ariz., didn’t vote. ? Sen. Rand Paul doubles down against Markwayne Mullin, says past behavior makes him “unfit to lead law enforcement”pic.twitter.com/eT2VsJFVEG— Derrick Evans (@DerrickEvans4WV) March 18, 2026 Trump chose Mullin to lead the department just minutes after the White House announced former Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem was leaving the post. Mullin will now lead an agency that has been shut down since Feb. 14. Senate Democrats refused to fund the department over unmet demands to reform Immigration and Customs Enforcement. Democrat demands include requiring agents to obtain a judicial warrant before apprehending suspects, limiting immigration enforcement near polling locations, and prohibiting ICE agents from wearing masks. During his confirmation hearing, Mullin signaled that he would be willing to make reforms to the agency if confirmed. “Judicial warrants will be used to go into houses, into places of business, unless we’re pursuing someone who enters that place,” Mullin said. “I have not mixed words with that, and I haven’t changed my opinion about that.” While some Republicans believe that Noem’s departure could make it easier to reopen DHS, Democrats have not budged on their demands. The post 2 Democrats Side With Republicans to Confirm Mullin for DHS Secretary appeared first on The Daily Signal.

Editor’s note: This is a lightly edited transcript of today’s video from Daily Signal Senior Contributor Victor Davis Hanson. Subscribe to our YouTube channel to see more of his videos. Hello, this is Victor Davis Hanson. We’re concluding the third week of the Israeli-United States effort to emasculate Iran, and we’re, sort of, in a standoff period. I think people have compared Iran to the black knight in the old Monty Python movie. The more that he loses a leg and arm, the more he thinks that it’s just a scratch. By all traditional methodology and criteria, Iran is now inert. This is what President Donald Trump keeps saying. The navy is nonexistent. There is no air force. There are no missile defenses that can interrupt allied planes going over the country. The army is useless because nobody is fighting on the ground. We keep hearing that, and I think accurately, that missiles and drones have been attrited, either by bombing or by being intercepted or being expended, to about 10%. So, what is the remaining obstacle? Target-wise, it’s just two or three. There seems to be caches or secret locations where you have three or four ballistic missiles or three or four drone sites with maybe 20 or 30 drones, and those are very hard to find. So, you’re going to be able to stop almost all of the incoming, but not all of them. And because they’re aimed at residential areas. Remember, the United States and Israel are trying to hit military targets and command and control, and any civilian damage is collateral. But in the case of Iran, it’s deliberately targeting hotels in Dubai or hotels and airports in Qatar or cluster bomb attacks on civilian high-rises in Tel Aviv or Jerusalem. That’s what they want to do. So, what’s going to happen? The thing to remember, I think, historically, is that tactical success is not necessarily equivalent to strategic victory or resolution. By that, I mean, you can argue that when Napoleon invaded Russia, he won almost every battle and he captured Moscow. But he did not have a plan to force the czar out, Alexander. He had no plan to force him out. He had no ability to go beyond Moscow to get the fleeing imperial forces of Russia. Same thing with the Germans. They won every battle up until they were within the first subway station of Moscow around Dec. 10, 1941. But they did not have a plan to, or they were not able to take Leningrad, St. Petersburg, take Moscow, and drive all of the Russians out of European and industrialized Russia. Or, barring that, to bomb the factories that were on the other side of the Ural Mountains. They did not have a plan. So, they didn’t have a strategic victory. They had impressive tactical victories. We had impressive tactical victories in Iraq and Afghanistan. It’s hard to think we lost a single battle in Iraq, but we did not have a plan of strategic resolution. So, where we are now in this war is Iran’s strategy is the following: that it can withstand repeated attacks on all of its military assets because it believes the United States cannot afford either politically, economically, socially, culturally to put ground troops after the fiascos in Afghanistan and Iraq. So, it doesn’t have to worry about an invasion to displace the regime. It also believes that the more that we hit any civilian targets out of frustration, the more it will hurt the Iranian people and the more the theocracy will say, “You may not like us, but the fact that you don’t have water or power or fuel is because they hate you and us.” And that’s another strategy they are taking. In other words, they’re saying as long as we have oil, Kharg Island, and as long as we have these huge oil fields, when you get tired of pounding us into rubble, you’re going go back to the United States. Israel’s going to go back and be quiet, and we’re going to get all of our oil revenues and we’re going have them. And we are going to buy from Russia, North Korea, and China missiles, drones, recreate our own drone industry, and we probably have enough fissile material that you didn’t get, and nobody could get. It’s hidden deep in the mountains, that we will make bombs. And this time we’re going to use them because we understand what you will do next time. And more importantly, we are planning practically that Donald Trump is an aberration. The last seven presidents didn’t attack us, even though we blew up your American Embassy in Beirut, your barracks and Marines in Beirut, Khobar Towers, behind the USS Cole, behind the embassy destruction in Africa. So, we believe that the norm is not Trump. He will be gone in two and a half years, and we will get either a left-wing Democrat or a neo-isolationist Republican or some Republican that’s feckless and not going to do anything. So, all we have to do is outlast Trump and have the oil, and we’ll come back. His opposition said he had no point, no agenda, no purpose. He did. He said it on March 1 and March 20. He said he had a multifaceted agenda. No. 1, he wanted to destroy the ability to launch missiles. He’s pretty close to that. Not completely. But get rid of their missiles, not just the missiles that they launch, but the ability to make them. No. 2, he said he wanted to destroy their air forces and air defenses so that they would have no air superiority, but the Americans and Israelis have the air supremacy. When you reach air supremacy, you can use tactical aircraft. That would mean Warthogs at low level, Apaches. You can do anything you want if you have air supremacy. And we do now. He wanted to destroy additionally the navy. He’s almost done that. No. 4, he wanted to preclude the ability of Iran not just to launch ballistic missiles, but to make another bomb. He’s bombed all of the nuclear sites that he hit before. He’s bombed the fabrication plants. He’s killed more of the scientists. He’s even attacked a university research area. So, pretty much, it’ll be very, very hard for them for eight, nine years unless they get a lot of Chinese help and North Korean help, and they come in en masse. The fifth agenda is a little bit less clear because he never said my reason is to go in there and—he might’ve thought that, he might’ve implied it, but if you look at his written statement and what he said formally, regime change. And yet we all know that the regime change, whether it be the Venezuela model or a true uprising of the dissatisfied Iranian public to take control of the government and have a constitutional system, whichever the replacement is, it’s preferable to the mullahs. But we are not going to be able to shepherd that in because we’re not going to go in on the ground. All we can do is emasculate the theocracy and then hope that there’s a popular uprising. And then we have to be very careful because if we’re going to drain the theocracy of their ability to recoup and have money, then you have to go into Kharg Island. If you go into Kharg Island and grab the oil or attack the oil fields, then you’re hurting the people that supposedly you want to help to take over the government. At some point, and I don’t know what it is, you don’t know what it is, I don’t think anybody knows where it is, Iran will have no more viable targets. The United States will be looking at its arsenals and wanting to make sure that we have enough if China does go into Taiwan because it’s angry that we have begun in Venezuela, kicked it out of Venezuela, kicked it out of Iran, kicked it out of everywhere we could. We have to be very careful. At some point, the Israelis, the Americans and the Iranians will think it’s not in their interest to continue, and we don’t know when that point is. For us in the United States, it’s when the economy and the price of gas gets to such a level that it becomes almost impossible, given the hostile media and the propaganda that’s coming from the Left that this is a disaster, that Donald Trump cannot win the midterms. And therefore, the entire MAGA agenda will be inert in the next two and a half years. If that starts to crystallize, then he will probably say we’ve done enough, and we now turn it over to the Iranian people. Then it’ll be a question, will the Iranians, when there’s not an active war going on and when there’s such damage to the theocracy, will they come out? Especially if we arm them, or we have people in there that can arm them. And will that regime fall in the next four or five months? If it should do that, that will be to the credit of Donald Trump. As far as the regime, again, it will do anything, lie, steal, murder, anything to stay in power because it knows it’s on the back of a lion or tiger. If it steps off, they’re all going to be jailed and probably executed for what they’ve done to the Iranian people. We publish a variety of perspectives. Nothing written here is to be construed as representing the views of The Daily Signal. The post Victor Davis Hanson: Trump Won The Battle, But Will He Take Iran? appeared first on The Daily Signal.

Michigan’s Democrat attorney general cited the Southern Poverty Law Center’s “hate map” when announcing a “hate-crimes unit” in 2019, and after one of the conservative groups on the map sued, the AG’s office won’t say whether it will refuse to cite the SPLC in the future. The American Freedom Law Center, a Judeo-Christian public interest law firm that the SPLC calls an “anti-Muslim hate group” because it warns against radical Islam, sued Michigan AG Dana Nessel and Agustin Arbulu, then-director of the state’s Department of Civil Rights. Nessel and Arbulu had issued a press release in February 2019, citing the SPLC map. Nessel said she was “establishing a hate-crimes unit” in order “to fight against hate crimes and the many hate groups which have been allowed to proliferate in our state.” After a lengthy court delay due to the COVID-19 pandemic, a district court granted Nessel’s motion for summary judgment, ruling against the American Freedom Law Center in August. The court ruled that the center lacked standing to bring the suit because it could not demonstrate concrete harm from the government, citing the SPLC accusation. AFLC appealed, and the Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals heard the case on Thursday. Nessel Won’t Swear Off SPLC During oral arguments, the judge asked Assistant Solicitor General Kyla Barranco, representing Nessel, whether the AG’s office would commit to not publishing the SPLC’s “hate map” again. “Is the state committing to not publishing this list again?” the judge asked. “Your honor, they don’t have any intention to, I can tell you that,” Barranco replied. “And I can tell you that the attorney general will be out of office in eight months.” Barranco noted that Nessel’s office removed the press release with the “hate map” from the website in 2020, and the hate-crimes unit has not prosecuted AFLC. Another judge asked whether Nessel considers AFLC to be a “hate group.” “Your honor, she was not deposed in this case, so there’s no testimony on what she thinks,” Barranco replied. “I don’t think that she believes that they are a hate group. I think she knows that they are on the Southern Poverty Law Center‘s website, but whether that means that they are a hate group or not, she has never communicated that to me.” “It is not my understanding that she believes they are a hate group,” she added. The Daily Signal reached out to Nessel’s office, asking if the attorney general would pledge not to cite the SPLC “hate map” or its “hate group” list for the remainder of her time in office. Nessel’s office did not respond by publication time. Similarly, a judge asked Heather Meingast, who represented Michigan Civil Rights Director John Johnson, whether the department would commit to avoid using the SPLC list of “hate groups.” “There’s no indication that there’s any intent to use this website again,” Meingast responded. The department did not respond to The Daily Signal’s request for comment by publication time. Also, during oral arguments, a judge asked Barranco whether AFLC would have standing to bring the case to trial if it could prove that a donor had decided to withdraw a $15 donation due to Nessel citing the SPLC “hate map.” “I think that would perhaps be enough to get it to trial,” Barranco said. She added, however, that AFLC would have to trace the loss of the donation to Nessel’s statement, not the SPLC’s attack. Robert Muise, co-founder and senior counsel at AFLC, told The Daily Signal that he planned to submit evidence to that effect. The SPLC ‘Hate Map’ The SPLC gained its reputation by suing Ku Klux Klan groups into bankruptcy in the 1980s. Now, the SPLC publishes a “hate map” that plots mainstream conservative and Christian groups alongside Klan chapters, suggesting that a similar hatred drives them. The SPLC’s education arm, Learning for Justice, promotes critical race theory (the lens that claims America is systemically racist and needs fundamental reform) and transgender ideology in schools, while the SPLC puts parental rights groups opposing these ideologies on the “hate map.” A terrorist used the SPLC’s map to target the Family Research Council for an attempted mass shooting in 2012, but the building manager foiled the attack. The shooter received a 25-year prison sentence. The SPLC long defended itself from accusations that it is “anti-Christian” by noting that it did not put the Christian ministry Focus on the Family on the “hate map,” but the center added the organization last year. In 2019, amid a racial discrimination and sexual harassment scandal, the SPLC fired its co-founder, Morris Dees, and staff formed a union. In 2024, amid a round of layoffs, the SPLC’s union accused the center of engaging in “union-busting.” Despite this, the Biden administration developed close ties with the SPLC. The Biden White House hosted SPLC leaders and staff, President Joe Biden elevated an SPLC attorney to a federal judgeship, and the Justice Department brought in SPLC staff to train prosecutors on the “anti-LGBTQ movement.” The post Democrat AG Won’t Swear Off Using Far-Left ‘Hate Map’ That Inspired Terrorist Attack appeared first on The Daily Signal.

Operation Epic Fury has hit home for the Buckeye State. Last Wednesday, three members of the U.S. military from Ohio returned home after paying the ultimate sacrifice. President Donald Trump was in attendance for the dignified transfer as America remembers and honors these fallen soldiers. Ohio natives Cpt. Seth Koval, Cpt. Curtis Angst, and Tech. Sgt. Tyler Simmons were among the six killed on March 12 aboard a KC-135 fueling tanker that crashed while refueling. All three were members of the Ohio Air National Guard, part of the U.S. Air Force. The crash was not caused by hostile or friendly fire, according to U.S. Central Command. It occurred in friendly airspace in western Iraq during the operation against Iran. Their courage will never be forgotten. ?? pic.twitter.com/hUqzwKikMO— The White House (@WhiteHouse) March 18, 2026 Cpt. Seth Koval, 30, of Stoutsville Koval served as a KC-135 instructor pilot assigned to the 166th Air Refueling Squadron at Rickenbacker Air National Guard Base in Columbus. Rep. Troy Balderson, R-Ohio, represents Ohio’s 12th Congressional District, which includes Stoutsville. He issued a statement on X honoring the sacrifice of Koval and the others who died in the crash. I am heartbroken by the loss of six servicemembers during an aerial refueling mission in Iraq. Three of those lost were Ohioans serving in the Ohio Air National Guard. These brave Americans answered the call to serve our nation, and their sacrifice will never be forgotten.…— Congressman Troy Balderson (@RepBalderson) March 13, 2026 Last Friday, Balderson introduced a resolution to honor those servicemembers. He was joined by fellow Ohio Republicans, Reps. Dave Taylor and Mike Carey. Republican Ohio State Sen. Tim Schaffer, who represents District 20, also memorialized Koval in a statement for The Daily Signal, saying he was “saddened” to learn that one of the fallen was from his district. “We remember him as a hero for his patriotism and bravery. Please uplift his family in prayer. Rest in peace, Captain Seth Koval,” Shaffer shared. He heaped praise on the “brave military heroes who made the ultimate sacrifice for our country.” “We are forever grateful for their service and sacrifice, and we pray for their families. God bless them all,” Schaffer added. Cpt. Curtis Angst, 30, of Wilmington, Ohio Angst was a KC-135 pilot, also assigned to the 166th Air Refueling Squadron. Wilmington Mayor Pat Haley and his city hope to honor Angst once a memorial is approved by the family, WKRC reported. Haley told The Daily Signal that the family is “working out the details” for arrangements, which involves “coordinating with the military.” Taylor, who represents Ohio’s 2nd Congressional District that represents Wilmington, Ohio, memorialized the fallen in a statement for The Daily Signal. “Captain Curtis Angst of Columbus served for an entire decade, leaving behind a legacy of selfless sacrifice and an unwavering commitment to his country. He will be remembered as an American hero,” Taylor said. The “tragedy,” Taylor added, “is a solemn reminder that freedom is not free, and we owe a debt of gratitude to the crew members who gave their lives in service to our country.” Republican Ohio State Sen. Kyle Koehler of District 10 told The Daily Signal that, “Captain Curtis Angst’s name will now be remembered with the thousands of men and women who have given the ‘last full measure of devotion’ to protect and defend our freedoms.” “My heart goes out to his wife and family,” Koehler continued. “We are forever grateful for his sacrifice, which is now their sacrifice.” “In this year where we celebrate this country’s 250th anniversary, I am humbled by those who still fight to this day to defend our rights to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,” Koehler added. Tech. Sgt. Tyler Simmons, 28, of Columbus Simmons was a KC-135 Boom Operator with the 166th Air Refueling Station and was posthumously promoted to master sergeant. Statements came flooding in throughout Columbus to honor Simmons. “I am heartbroken to learn of the loss of Tyler Simmons, a proud member of our community who chose a life of service to this nation,” Ohio State Rep. Dontavius Jarrells, a Democrat representing the 1st District, said. “Tyler represented the very best of us, courageous enough to answer the call of duty and committed to something greater than himself,” Jarrells continued. “My prayers are with his family, his fellow service members, and everyone who loved him. As a community, we honor his sacrifice, we remember his life, and we hold close the responsibility to never take for granted the freedoms secured by men and women like Tyler.” Ohio State Sen. Hearcel Craig, a Democrat representing District 15, also honored Simmons in a statement shared with The Daily Signal. “My heart is heavy at the tragic loss of Sgt. Tyler Simmons, a brave and honorable young man from our community who dedicated his life to serving his country in the U.S. Air Force,” Craig said. “As a proud graduate of Eastmoor High School and through his extraordinary service, Tyler represented the very best of our community. May our prayers be with his family, friends, and fellow service members as we honor Tyler’s exemplary life and sacrifice.” Columbus Mayor Andrew Ginther mourned for Simmons, whose “life was taken far too soon.” “We honor his memory as a true hero who served our country with courage and dedication,” Ginther added. Rep. Joyce Beatty, a Democrat who represents Ohio’s 3rd Congressional District, spoke of the effects of war. “War touches everyone, regardless of background or political affiliation,” Beatty told The Daily Signal. “Tech. Sgt. Simmons’ sacrifice will never be forgotten, and his legacy will live on through the lives he touched during his twenty-eight years of life.” All members were honored by a pilot in the Ohio airspace. A pilot paid tribute to the three Ohio Air National Guardsmen who were among the six killed in a refueling aircraft crash in western Iraq. pic.twitter.com/yFczFrm0a8— CBS News (@CBSNews) March 22, 2026 Effect of War Beatty also shared concerns about the ongoing campaign against Iran. “Trump’s unfettered action in Iran has already led to the death of approximately 13 brave service members,” Beatty said. “War has a real, genuine, cost.” “That is why it’s imperative that Congress be involved in a decision of this magnitude. It is unacceptable that Trump has continually bypassed Congressional approval,” she added. Beatty has supported efforts in Congress for a War Powers Resolution on the Iran conflict. Donald Trump was required to seek Congressional approval before striking Iran — but he didn’t. Now, his reckless actions have put American troops in danger, leaving them vulnerable to retaliation. The safety of Americans must come first: Congress must quickly vote on the War…— Rep. Joyce Beatty (@RepBeatty) February 28, 2026 Taylor, meanwhile, expressed his support for Operation Epic Fury and called out “the Iranian regime of terror.” “For too long, the Iranian regime of terror has threatened freedom around the globe, and I commend our fearless Commander in Chief and our courageous servicemembers for answering the call of duty,” Taylor said. “I stand resolutely behind our servicemembers and their families as we ensure America is the land of the free and home of the brave for generations to come.” The post Ohio Military Service Members Return Home After Paying Ultimate Sacrifice in Epic Fury appeared first on The Daily Signal.

With Congress’ spring break scheduled to start this week, President Donald Trump is demanding that the Senate stays in Washington, D.C. to pass the SAVE America Act and fund the Department of Homeland Security “for Jesus.” Rather than tackle DHS funding and the SAVE America Act separately, Trump is now pushing the Senate to bundle the two priorities together. “I’m tying homeland security to voter identification,” Trump said, referencing the SAVE America Act, at a Make America Safe Again event in Memphis, Tennessee. The President said photo ID and proof of citizenship are the most important things to protecting our homeland, “so it should be part of the homeland security bill,” he continued. “I’m requesting that the Republican Senators do this immediately. You don’t have to take a fast vote, don’t worry about Easter and going home. In fact, make this one for Jesus.” Trump said.   Trump has repeatedly insisted that the SAVE America Act, which would require proof of citizenship to vote and implement nationwide voter ID, must be passed to secure American elections. The president has also sought to expand the election integrity legislation to include other priorities, such as banning men from women’s sports and protect children from transgender surgeries. The Senate has sought to pursue the SAVE America Act and homeland security efforts simultaneously, but Trump told Senate Republican leadership and posted on Truth on Sunday that the SAVE America Act should take priority. By Monday, Trump said that instead of pursuing these items separately, they should be packaged together. President Trump JUST declared that the Senate GOP will stand firm, forgo Easter Recess and take as long as needed to get the SAVE America Act passed through the Senate."Make this one for Jesus."No vacations until the the bill is on his desk. Get it done. pic.twitter.com/NDcfDSD9no— Andrew Kolvet (@AndrewKolvet) March 23, 2026 Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., kept the Senate in Washington through the weekend to continue debating the SAVE America Act, but the president’s demand to stay in session over the Easter break is a big ask. However, some Republican senators who believe the urgent need for the SAVE America Act responded positively to the president’s call. “Every Senate Republican needs to be willing to do WHATEVER it takes to get this done. If that means busting the filibuster or staying here through Easter, then so be it,” Sen. Tommy Tuberville, R-Ala., told The Daily Signal. Which would you rather the Senate do for the two weeks following March 27th?— Mike Lee (@BasedMikeLee) March 23, 2026 “We shouldn’t even have to do this,” Tuberville continued. “But this has to be done because the radical, socialist Democrats who hate this country and President Trump are doing everything in their power to hang onto their voting base of illegal aliens—even if it means forcing TSA agents to go without pay and putting American lives at risk.”  “It’s time to grow a backbone and realize we work for the American people and NOT ourselves,” Tuberville added. Like the president, House Republicans have also put pressure on the Senate to pass the SAVE America Act. Rep. Keith Self, R-Texas, implored the Senate to “not take a day off, do not take a weekend, don’t take a recess, don’t take a CODEL out of the country,” in a Newsmax interview on Monday. “Stay on the senate floor for as long as it takes until the Democrats cry uncle and say, ‘we will now pass SAVE America,'” Self continued. “It is that important.”   Self is one of several House Republicans who have agreed to block any Senate bills from passing in the lower chamber until the Senate passes the SAVE America Act.   Happy to give up the two week Easter/Passover recess in order to get the Save America Act passed and DHS reopened.I’ll stay in DC for as long as it takes!— Congressman Randy Fine (@RepFine) March 23, 2026 Rep. Randy Fine, R-Fla., says he is happy to give up the two-week holiday recess to get SAVE America and DHS re-opened. “I’ll stay in DC for as long as it takes!” said Fine on X.   Today he announced that funding the Department of Homeland Security should also be added to the bill.   directing the Senate to add DHS funding to the and stay in Washington until they pass it, even if that means missing their Spring Break vacations.  The post Trump Tells Senators to Pass the SAVE America Act ‘For Jesus’  appeared first on The Daily Signal.