Noem Transfers DSU Grad from DHS Cybersecurity Position Day After Rough Meeting with Critical Democrat

Madhu Gottumukkala is one of the South Dakota cronies Kristi Noem dragged along with her to the Department of Homeland Security:

Gottumukkala had no prior experience in the federal government before Noem appointed him last May as the deputy director of CISA. He worked in private sector IT roles for more than two decades, and then served a 10-month stint under then-governor Noem as South Dakota’s chief information officer, according to his LinkedIn page. He holds a PhD in information systems from Dakota State University [John Sakellariadis, “Canceled Contracts, a Failed Polygraph and Personal Disputes: Inside the Turbulent Tenure of Noem’s Former Cyber Czar,” Politico, 2026.02.28].

DSU probably won’t be featuring Gottumukkala on their promotional materials, as Gottumukkala, like his petty, underinformed, and underqualified boss, has made a botch of the job:

In his roughly nine months as acting director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, Madhu Gottumukkala made a series of decisions that alienated career staff, created friction with Trump appointees and provoked scrutiny from influential lawmakers on both sides of the aisle. Nine current and four former cyber officials who spoke with POLITICO over the last several weeks said his tenure was so chaotic that it was hampering the agency’s core mission: protecting sensitive government networks from a crush of cyberattacks.

…In August, Gottumukkala triggered a DHS-wide damage assessment by uploading sensitive agency contracting documents into a public version of ChatGPT that other staff at the agency weren’t permitted to use for security reasons.

And Gottumukkala angered career staff and fellow Trump appointees by taking a hatchet to some major agency contracts — in some cases without due consideration for their importance to CISA’s cyber defense mission, or without properly alerting agency staff so they could find workarounds, according to four current officials. He gave little notice before deciding not to renew one such contract — a $30 million license CISA staff used to identify vulnerable internet-connected devices across government agencies — ahead of its expiry, they said.

“I don’t think people realized how ill-served we, the American public, were by having someone that was this unserious, just asleep at the wheel in an agency leadership position like this,” said one of the four officials.

Agency staff also say Gottumukkala did not take accountability for his missteps and often lashed out at his staff — which resulted in the dismissal of nearly a dozen employees while the agency continued to face a workforce shortage.

POLITICO previously reported that DHS placed a swath of CISA employees on leave after Gottumukkala failed a counterintelligence polygraph exam last July. DHS later dismissed the polygraph as “unsanctioned” and accused staff of “misleading” Gottumukkala about the need for the test [Sakellariadis, 2026.02.28].

Secretary Noem Thursday moved Gottumukkala to “director of strategic implementation”, which sounds like the office administrator job Pam created for herself on The Office. Noem could have and should have addressed Gottumukkala’s undermining of national security sooner, but, you know, image:

The frustration with Gottumukkala was shared by several administration officials, two of whom told Noem as far back as November that Gottumukkala should not be in charge at CISA, according to three current cybersecurity officials with knowledge of those conversations.

But Noem was hesitant to remove Gottumukkala until recently because she and DHS special adviser Corey Lewandowski — President Donald Trump’s former campaign manager — feared it would reflect poorly on her, as she was already facing immense pressure over DHS’s immigration crackdown and other issues, two of those three officials said [Sakellariadis, 2026.02.28].

Noem might have finally demoted Gottumukkala out of frustration over her own unpleasant meeting Wednesday with a Congresswoman trying to hold the Secretary accountable:

The US congresswoman Delia Ramirez, one of the most vocal pro-immigrant national lawmakers, pressed for the secretary of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), Kristi Noem, to resign during a “combative” closed-door meeting between the two on Wednesday, according to a Guardian interview with the representative and a follow-up letter submitted to Noem.

The meeting was the first one-on-one private meeting that Noem has had with a Democratic member of Congress since her tenure at the top of the DHS began last year.

…“I needed to look at evil in the eye and make sure she understood that I will continue to work and ensure she no longer leads the department,” Ramirez said.

…“It went as I expected it would go,” Ramirez said, adding that “my position on her leadership has not changed”, with the representative continuing to push for Noem’s resignation, impeachment or firing.

…According to Ramirez, Noem refused during the Wednesday meeting to recognize facts and “viciously lied” when the representative brought up various examples of DHS officials allegedly violating the law or engaging in tactics seen as extremely aggressive and out of the expected norm for confrontations with immigration targets or non-violent protesters.

“The secretary was unwilling to accept all the ways that she continues to violate due process, violate the constitution, violate court orders,” Ramirez said. “It was a conversation in which she lied about what her agents are doing on the ground.”

…“I think that she knows that her days are numbered,” Ramirez said, when asked about why Noem decided to meet with her. “I think she knows that I have been one of the most vocal about specific ways that she has violated due process, violated the rule of law, engaged in corruption, and I am one of the members that has really been intentional on leading the charge to an actual coordinated strategy to get her impeached” [José Olivares, “Kristi Noem Meets with Democratic Lawmaker in ‘Combative’ Meeting About ICE Conduct,” The Guardian, 2026.02.26].

Hmm… push Noem hard enough, and we can at least get her to take out some of her shoddier subordinates? But remember: shoddy subordinates like Gottumukkala are in place, harming national security, only because shoddy Secretary Noem herself put them there, because Noem herself isn’t good at anything other than personal image-building and ass-kissing. Gottumukkala is just one more reason that the Senators she faces at the Capitol on Tuesday should stand with Congresswoman Ramirez and demand Noem’s resignation.