Today on the Listen Frontier podcast, we’re talking about one of the more surprising political shakeups in Washington — the firing of Kristi Noem and the appointment of Oklahoma Sen. Markwayne Mullin to replace her.

Noem was abruptly pushed out of her role leading the Department of Homeland Security by President Donald Trump, setting off a scramble over who would take over one of the federal government’s most powerful agencies — responsible for border security, immigration enforcement, disaster response and counterterrorism.

Trump’s pick of Oklahoma Senator Markwayne Mullin stunned many. If confirmed, Mullin would leave what is often considered one of the most secure jobs in American politics — a U.S. Senate seat — to take on a Cabinet position in an administration known for frequent turnover.

To help us break down what happened, why Mullin might take the job, and what it could mean for Oklahoma politics, I’m joined by Reese Gorman.

Reese is a national political reporter for NOTUS covering Congress and the Trump administration. Before that, he worked here in Oklahoma as a reporter for The Frontier.

Frontier: Hey everyone. Welcome to another episode of listen frontier today. I am joined by Hart Brown, the president of artificial intelligence and transformation at Saxum. He also helped author Governor Stitt's Artificial Intelligence strategy for the state. Thanks for joining us today. I wondered if you would tell us a little bit first about yourself, your background and how you got involved in this project and in this area.

Hart Brown: You bet. Coming out of school, I was doing a lot of work in what we now refer to as predictive analysis, so algorithmic based decision making, using math to help understand what's likely to happen and then make the best decisions you possibly can.

I had a number of people come to me and say Hart, can you build an artificial intelligence system that can do what you do on paper in real time? I answered. I said let's find out. It sounds really interesting. At that time, there was really only one system that anybody could really use, and that was IBM Watson. And so I built an artificial intelligence system on top of IBM Watson to be able to leverage this algorithm in real time. And got very good success.

Frontier: So let's talk about the governor's report a little bit. The document calls itself a forward thinking approach, which is right means, in a lot of ways, that some of it is aspirational in a sense that we're at a point where we don't exactly know where we're going to end up with AI. What are some of the concrete things that Oklahoma could do in the next six months, 12 months that are realistic to embrace AI better or better understand how it’s shaping Oklahoma?

Hart Brown: It’s really important to understand that we're really talking about a longer timeline. So some elements of that are going to happen closer to a two year time frame. Some may be a little bit further out now. We're transitioning from a period of time where artificial intelligence really kind of felt like a toy. It was interesting, it was fun. We all started to use it. We downloaded the apps. We were making pictures and lots of different things. Oklahoma is in a relatively low unemployment environment, meaning it's hard for Oklahoma employers to find good people to hire, and so with that, let's use the technology. Let's grow the businesses as quickly as we can by leveraging that in a responsible and reasonable way.

Frontier: Is it even possible at this point to have guardrails, or to know what the guardrails would even be? At some point, it will start to affect people's jobs. You mentioned low unemployment, people having difficulty filling some of these positions that maybe AI could replace, but at some point people's jobs will be what's being replaced. And so are there guardrails to protect workers? Or how should people approach that part of the discussion?

Hart Brown: From an economic productivity perspective, I need everybody working and I need everybody using the technology. If the technology replaces people in this ecosystem, I don't get the economic value out of the system at the end of the day. And really what we're seeing in the next two to three years, whichever country maximizes its potential related to artificial intelligence, is likely to be the dominant economic country for the next 75 to 100 years. So first and foremost, I need everybody in the ecosystem being productive.

It doesn't make sense for us to have a broad based disruption of the employment environment, because we don't win at the end of the day. We won't be the dominant economic country. So I'm very optimistic that if we do see that turbulence, that we have enough opportunities to resolve that before it really becomes a problem.

Frontier: Looking at the strategy and at this report, if we revisit it in five or 10 years, what would success look like in Oklahoma, and what would count as a failure that Oklahoma should be willing to try to avoid?

Hart Brown: Five years is a great horizon. What I would love to be able to say is that Oklahoma is at the forefront of artificial intelligence and advanced technology for the country and the world, which absolutely we have that that opportunity, I would say, from an economic perspective, that we've grown our economy by 40% here in the state overall by being able to do This, and that is a benefit to every single individual here in the state. So those two things, I think, are incredibly important for us moving forward, and we can accomplish that in a five year window.

Immigration detention usually happens out of public view — inside private prisons, through sealed court filings, and far from scrutiny. But in Oklahoma, those cases are starting to surface.

In recent months, immigrants who’ve lived in the U.S. for years — some for decades — have been jailed for months without bond hearings, even when they have no criminal convictions and deep ties to their communities. Their only path to release has been through habeas corpus petitions filed in federal court.

At the same time, Oklahoma is becoming a growing hub for immigration detention as private prison companies expand their footprint.

Our reporter, Ari Fie, has been digging into these cases to understand who’s being detained, why this is happening now, and what it means for due process. I spoke with her about what she found.

For the past several months, Frontier reporter Clifton Adcock has been digging into one of the fastest-moving — and least transparent — developments in Oklahoma: the rapid rise of data centers. These facilities promise big investment, but they also bring enormous demands for power and water, and much of the planning has happened out of public view.

In this week’s Q&A, Clifton walks us through how he pieced this story together: from tracking down hard-to-find utility filings to decoding dense regulatory documents and uncovering data center projects that weren’t publicly disclosed. He also talks about the challenges of explaining highly technical issues in a way readers can understand, and what surprised him most as he followed the money, energy, and incentives behind Oklahoma’s data-center boom.

Read the story: Oklahoma’s data center boom is about to hit the grid — and your power bill

klahoma voters won’t choose their next governor for another year, but the Republican primary is already heating up. Recent polling from former Oklahoma House Speaker Charles McCall’s campaign suggests the race between McCall and Attorney General Gentner Drummond is closer than you might think. But as other candidates begin to join the fray, the Drummond camp says that’s not true.

The survey, conducted September 23–25, found Attorney General Gentner Drummond leading with 35% support, closely followed by House Speaker Charles McCall at 33%, while 32% of respondents remained undecided.

The Frontier spoke with pollster Chris Wilson about his recent survey for the McCall campaign and Matthew Parker, Drummond’s campaign chairman, about how the candidates are positioning themselves to voters. The following is a condensed transcript of the conversation. For the full interview, listen to our podcast. The margin of error is 3.5%.

This week on Listen Frontier, we’re looking at Operation SAFE, Governor Kevin Stitt’s effort to clear homeless encampments in Tulsa with the help of the Oklahoma Highway Patrol.

The Frontier sat down with Gov. Stitt, who told me the operation isn’t about solving homelessness, but about enforcing the law. He said Oklahomans are experiencing “compassion fatigue,” and that many of the people removed from encampments “didn’t want help.”

We also spoke with Steven Whitaker, CEO of Tulsa’s John 3:16 Mission, who offered a different view. Whitaker acknowledged the risks of being too compassionate, but stressed that the people living on Tulsa’s streets are our neighbors, and most of them are in desperate need of empathy, shelter, and support.

Together, their perspectives paint a complicated picture of homelessness in Tulsa, and the deep divide over how the state and city should respond.