DHS awarded $220M in no-bid advertising contracts under Noem, funneling work to firms tied to her inner circle

On February 13, 2025, DHS awarded a $143 million no-bid advertising contract to Safe America Media LLC, a Delaware limited liability company that had been incorporated just seven days earlier. A second no-bid contract worth $77 million was simultaneously awarded to People Who Think LLC, a Louisiana Republican advertising firm. Together the contracts totaled approximately $220 million — a figure that represented a tripling of DHS's advertising budget. The campaign, branded "Stronger Border, Stronger America," prominently featured Secretary Kristi Noem, including a television spot filmed October 2, 2025, at Mount Rushmore — the second day of the federal government shutdown — in which Noem appeared on horseback and delivered immigration enforcement messages.

DHS justified bypassing the standard competitive bidding process by invoking a "national emergency" at the southern border, warning that "any delay in providing these critical communications to the public will increase the spread of misinformation, especially misinformation by smugglers." Federal contracting experts, including former Commission on Wartime Contracting member Charles Tiefer, characterized the arrangement as "corrupt," specifically because the work was secretly subcontracted to the Strategy Group — an Ohio Republican consulting firm whose CEO, Ben Yoho, is married to Noem's DHS chief spokesperson and Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs, Tricia McLaughlin. McLaughlin's office funded the ad contracts. Yoho's firm had run Noem's 2022 South Dakota gubernatorial campaign and continued receiving payments from Noem's American Resolve PAC through February 2025, when Noem assumed the DHS Secretary role.

Corey Lewandowski, Noem's de facto chief of staff serving as a Special Government Employee, had long-standing professional ties to Yoho and the Strategy Group and was involved in soliciting and handling DHS contracts outside normal channels. Federal contracting records listed Safe America Media — a company registered to a residential address with no website, office, or social media presence — as the prime contractor, obscuring the Strategy Group's subcontractor role entirely.

Separately, Noem implemented a policy requiring her personal approval of all DHS grants and contracts exceeding $100,000. Given that the agency expected to handle more than 5,100 contract actions per federal quarter, the bottleneck effectively gave Noem — and by extension Lewandowski, who managed the day-to-day operation of her office — centralized control over agency-wide spending decisions. The policy caused significant delays in funding for federal disaster relief after a string of natural disasters in 2025.

Congressional scrutiny intensified through late 2025 and early 2026. In November 2025, ProPublica published an investigation revealing the Strategy Group's undisclosed subcontract role. Senate Democrats on the Homeland Security Committee subsequently demanded an IG investigation. During Senate and House hearings in early March 2026, members of Congress from both parties questioned Noem about the advertising expenditures. Noem claimed Trump had approved the spending; Trump publicly denied it.

Updates

2026-03-05 — Noem fired as DHS Secretary; Lewandowski left the department in her wake [4]

President Trump fired Kristi Noem as Secretary of Homeland Security on March 5, 2026, naming Senator Markwayne Mullin as her successor. Corey Lewandowski left the department following Noem's departure. The DHS Inspector General investigation into no-bid contract handling under Noem and Lewandowski continued after both had left the agency.

2026-03-26 — DHS IG launched investigation into contract handling under Noem and Lewandowski [3]

The DHS Office of Inspector General launched a "sprawling" investigation into how DHS contracts were solicited and handled under Noem and Lewandowski — separate from a previously announced annual audit of non-competitive DHS grants and contracts. Investigators ordered dozens of DHS officials to preserve records. The IG noted that DHS leadership had "systematically obstructed" its work over the preceding months, including denying access to internal records, in a letter listing 11 instances of obstruction sent to Congress shortly before Noem's departure.

2026-07-14 — DHS IG found Lewandowski involved in improper contract handling [4]

The DHS Office of Inspector General investigation determined that Corey Lewandowski was involved in improper handling of DHS contracts. Investigators found Lewandowski may have participated in steering contract decisions in ways that created conflicts of interest with his outside relationships, including ties to contractors who received no-bid work.