WATCH: Kennedy questions Noem about using taxpayer money for ad campaign featuring her prominently

Sen. John Kennedy, R-La., asked Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem in an oversight hearing Tuesday how she justifies the use of $220 million to run national TV ads that feature her prominently if she’s concerned with not wasting taxpayers' money.

Noem said President Donald Trump tasked her with “getting the message out” to people in the U.S. illegally that “they needed to leave or we would detain them and remove them, and they not get the chance to come back to America the right way.”

Noem, who fielded questions from the Senate Judiciary Committee Tuesday, repeated her claim that these ads have been “extremely effective.”

For clarification, Kennedy asked if Trump knew Noem was pursuing this ad campaign.

“Yes sir, we went through the legal processes,” the secretary said.

Noem’s agency has been roiled by turmoil and public outcry in recent days. The shooting of two U.S. citizens by federal officers in Minneapolis prompted weeks of protests in the Twin Cities area. Trump officials, including Noem, accused the victims – Renee Good and Alex Pretti – of committing acts of “domestic terrorism.”

But bystander videos challenged the administration’s narrative of the high-profile shooting deaths, and documented DHS deploying other aggressive tactics. Greater scrutiny by Democrats into the ways the Trump administration has been carrying out his mass deportation agenda led to a lapse in the agency’s funding and partial government shutdown.

Congressional lawmakers have yet to reach a deal to fund the department, though there are areas of bipartisan agreement, such as a body camera requirement for immigration enforcement agents.

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