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Kristi Noem’s husband was outed as a cross-dresser this week. As someone who’s a big fan of drag as an art form, this “scandal” gave me a lot to think on. Let’s talk about it.

The Bimbofication of Kristi Noem’s Moral Crusade

There’s a version of this story where what Bryon Noem did is simply none of our business.

A man explored a fetish in his private life, sent photos to consenting adults, and paid women online for a particular kind of roleplay. Strange? To many people, sure. Harmful? Not obviously. To think this rises to the level of public scandal? Absurd.

Unless, of course, you’re the husband of a politician who built her career on the premise that gender nonconformity is a moral emergency.

Kristi Noem is one of the most aggressively anti-drag politicians in America. As governor of South Dakota, she signed a religious freedom bill that sanctions discrimination against queer people. She spearheaded a campaign to ban drag shows, and even announced a hotline so people could report universities for encouraging drag performances.

Meanwhile, her husband Bryon was an active participant in the online “bimbofication” community. He confessed to being into exaggerated physical appearances and allegedly sent at least $25,000 to different models. He played the devoted husband of the deporter-in-chief by day, and fabricated a J-cup bosom for photoshoots by night.

Let’s be honest about what kind of story this actually is. The Bryon Noem revelations are a scandal of hypocrisy, not a scandal of wrongdoing. Cross-dressing is not wrong. Participating in online fetish communities between consenting adults is not wrong.

None of what Bryon Noem allegedly did — leaving aside questions about fidelity — would register as newsworthy if his wife hadn’t spent years telling voters that gender nonconformity was dangerous, deviant, and in need of government intervention.

This is a pattern the American right has revisited so many times it practically has its own genre. The politician who campaigns against gay rights and is later caught in an airport bathroom. The family-values crusader whose marriage is a wreck. The anti-porn legislator whose browser history tells a different story.

In every case, the real issue isn’t the private behavior — it’s the weaponization of other people’s identical behavior for political gain.

Noem rose to political power in part because of the wholesome image she projected. Then she devoted herself to an administration that launched a war on transgender people. The machine she served treated drag performers as predators, gender expression as grooming, and anything outside rigid norms as an existential threat to children.

That machine didn’t slow down because Bryon Noem was privately doing something it would publicly condemn. It kept going because the condemnation was never really about the behavior, it was about who was doing it.

It was always a tool. Never a belief.

Bryon Noem’s private life, whatever it consists of, didn’t hurt anyone. The policies his wife championed did. The drag bans, the hotlines, and the legislation all had real effects on real people.

There’s a lesson to be learned here: Shame is a political weapon, but it doesn’t work when you’re unashamed. Drag queens are A-list celebrities now. You won’t see them making headlines simply for cross-dressing. But that’s because they’re doing it openly and authentically.

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The Women Who Took the Fall

Let’s be clear: Every single person in Trump’s cabinet, regardless of gender, is entirely incompetent. But isn’t it a little weird that he’s only firing the women?

Within the span of a single month, Trump has fired two of the most prominent women in his Cabinet. He removed Kristi Noem from her position as DHS Secretary in early March, then announced just this week that Pam Bondi was out as Attorney General.

He then tapped Republican Senator Markwayne Mullin to succeed Noem at DHS. For Bondi’s replacement, Trump installed his former personal attorney, Todd Blanche. He’s reportedly considering Lee Zeldin, currently running the EPA, as a longer-term successor. All men.

The message is consistent: these women served him well, but ultimately they fell short. And conveniently, the things they fell short on were things Trump made impossible to navigate.

Bondi had become a scapegoat for MAGA conspiracy theorists frustrated that their fantasy of mass arrests of Democrats hasn’t materialized. Noem, similarly, was out there executing a brutal immigration crackdown. When the political heat became too much, she was the one who went. The men who designed the policies stayed.

There’s also the question of what comes next. Bondi was told she would be given a different job, with Trump suggesting he could appoint her as a judge. Trump then asserted she would be leaving government entirely. Noem was made Special Envoy for the Shield of the Americas — a title that sounds important and means very little.

Reports have also surfaced that Trump publicly blamed press secretary Karoline Leavitt for his bad press coverage. Another woman potentially in his crosshairs, per multiple outlets, is Tulsi Gabbard at the Director of National Intelligence.

Trump does fire men, too. He is, above all, an equal-opportunity chaos agent. But the pattern is worth naming.

The loyalty flows in one direction. The consequences, increasingly, seem to flow in another.

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Bari Weiss Is Cutting Back CBS. We’re Growing.

It took Bari Weiss less than six months to shutter CBS News Radio. A news institution that survived recessions, wars, and the entire digital media revolution — gone, just like that.

And now, she’s reportedly ready to “blow up” 60 Minutes itself the moment the season wraps in May. More layoffs are coming. More voices silenced.

This isn’t just a media story. This is a power story.

This is exactly why AlterNet America exists. We didn’t build this place because it was easy or because the money was great. We built it because someone has to. Because the kind of journalism that actually holds power accountable doesn’t happen by accident. It happens because people fight for it.

We don’t have a Paramount Skydance deal. We don’t have a David Ellison swooping in with a checkbook. We don’t have a billionaire patron with a pet agenda and a PR team to spin it. What we have is something those outlets will never be able to buy: you. Readers who actually give a damn.

Here’s the uncomfortable truth about corporate media: it can’t hold power accountable, because it is the power. The people who need to be investigated are, more often than not, the same people signing the checks.

AlterNet works for you. Full stop. No oligarch in the background. No deal that compromises what we cover or how we cover it. Just independent journalism trying to do right by the people who read it.

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The great work continues.

— Ryan Rose