You want proof the swamp didn’t drain itself?
Try this.
The sitting Secretary of Homeland Security says spyware was secretly installed on her phones and computers — not by a foreign adversary, not by hackers overseas — but by people inside her own department.
If that doesn’t send a chill down your spine, it should.
Because this wasn’t some rogue intern with a grudge. According to Secretary Kristi Noem, this was embedded behavior. Institutional. Normalized. Ongoing.
And it took Elon Musk to help uncover it.
Shortly after stepping into her role, Noem says she discovered that DHS staff members had installed spying software on her devices — and on the devices of other political hires.
Political appointees — working under a duly elected administration — were allegedly being monitored from inside their own agency.
Noem didn’t mince words. She wrote:
“Performing my role as Secretary of Homeland Security has shown me just how real and dangerous the deep state really is.
@elonmusk helped us find that a few DHS staff had installed spying software on the phones and computers of myself and other political hires. We found secret, secure rooms with hidden files that we turned over to attorneys.
Under the leadership of @POTUS Trump, @DHSgov is returning to the standard of excellence and behavior we expect our government agencies to function at. We will root out actors who do not have the interests of America in mind.”
That’s not bureaucratic dysfunction. That’s sabotage.
And it gets worse.
During her appearance on the PBD Podcast, Sec. Noem revealed even more.
Per The Daily Beast:
“We have to sweep my office on a regular basis to make sure that there’s not listening devices in it,” she said. “It was very prevalent, and I think that what happened at this department was individuals had gotten away with, for years, spying on people who were politically appointed and trying to stop an administration that was coming in and trying to fix this country and keep us safe.”
She also described discovering a secure room — a Sensitive Compartmented Information Facility — “that had secret files that nobody knew about on some of these most controversial topics.”
Those documents, she said, were turned over to attorneys.
Secret rooms. Hidden files. Internal surveillance. Political appointees monitored.
And this is happening inside the agency tasked with protecting the homeland.
The staffers responsible were identified and fired. But many are asking: is termination enough when government employees allegedly spy on their own leadership to undermine a duly elected administration?
The phrase “deep state” gets mocked in polite circles.
But what do you call entrenched bureaucrats who secretly monitor political leadership and attempt to obstruct policy direction?
This isn’t about party politics. It’s about chain of command. It’s about whether federal agencies answer to voters — or to themselves.
President Trump and Republicans were elected promising to clean house. But Noem’s account suggests that resistance inside the bureaucracy didn’t vanish. It burrowed deeper.
The question now isn’t whether it happened.
It’s how widespread it is.
If you want to hear Secretary Noem tell the entire story in her own words — including how Elon Musk uncovered the spyware and what was found in those secret rooms — watch her full interview on Patrick Bet-David’s podcast below.
After you watch it, ask yourself: how much of the government still operates in the shadows?