Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem described the “shocking” moment a mask-wearing thief “hooked” her pricey Gucci bag away during an Easter outing with family.
“It was kind of shocking, actually, because it was sitting right by my feet. I actually felt my purse — he hooked with his foot and drug it a few steps away and dropped a coat over it and took it,” the 53-year-old recounted to podcaster Vince Coglianese Wednesday.
“I thought it was my grandkids kicking me in the legs, but it was very professionally done,” she added on the “Vince” podcast. “It tells me that this happens all the time to people, and that they live in communities where this is a danger and it reaffirms why I’m here.”
Noem wasn’t sure whether she was targeted because of her role as DHS boss, and deferred to investigators about the thief’s motives.
A suspect had not been publicly identified as of Thursday afternoon and no arrests had been made.
“I think I was a busy grandma with … four grandkids under the age of four,” she said. “That’s how vulnerable people can be. So I think we need to be aware, but also be making sure there’s consequences for people like that — that make a living off of harming other people.”
Noem’s Gucci B large shoulder bag, available for $4,400 per the label’s website, contained $3,000 in cash as well as her driver’s license, passport, DHS badge, makeup, checks, bank card, healthcare card, medication, and apartment keys, an agency spokesperson told The Post Monday, adding that the secretary was using the money “to treat her family to dinner, activities, and Easter gifts.”
The bag also contained a Louis Vuitton Clemence Purse inside, which sells for $600, according to a complaint filed with local police.
Surveillance footage showed a white man in a N95 surgical mask, dark pants, a “fur-type” collar and a ball cap snatching Noem’s bag before leaving The Capital Burger restaurant about a mile from the White House, The Post has learned.
As DHS boss, Noem oversees a department in charge of agencies including the Secret Service, US Customs and Border Protection and the Coast Guard.
She touts an estimated net worth of about $1 million, according to financial disclosures filed late last year with the Office of Government Ethics.
Throughout her tenure at the helm of DHS, Noem has frequently been spotted out in the field during illegal immigrant roundups, clad in identical uniforms to officers.
“You don’t learn how vulnerable we are if you don’t realize the weak spots, and that’s why I’m out there on the front lines, talking with them and finding out, ‘What do you really need to do your job, and do you understand what the President wants you to do?’” she said Wednesday.
“That communication with the American people is important, but it’s also important for me making decisions every day. I don’t want to take all my information from people sitting behind desks in Washington.”
