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The theft of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem’s purse from a D.C. restaurant Sunday night raises several pressing questions. Who was the white man in a medical mask who did the deed? How did he escape the notice of Noem’s Secret Service detail? And most importantly: What the heck was Noem doing carrying around $3,000 in cash?

That’s right—in addition to her driver’s license, medication, apartment keys, work access badge, and makeup bag, Noem claims the thief got away with $3,000 in bills that she’d stashed in her purse. The median American has $8,000 in the bank; Noem had nearly half that in a bag resting against her foot under her chair when it was ganked.

Having recently staged a video op at a brutal El Salvador megaprison while wearing a $50,000 Rolex, Noem isn’t exactly gunning for a “Cabinet members: they’re just like us!” vibe. But average-American relatability isn’t the only reason to keep your thick stacks of hundos at home. Purses can be easily misplaced or forgotten. Pockets can be picked. Wallets can tumble to the ground. Unless you run an all-cash business, are visiting a high-end strip club, or find yourself in an area with minimal credit card access—none of which apply to a night out at the “luxury burger” chain where Noem’s bag was taken—it’s common sense to minimize the amount of cash on your person. This is well-trodden territory in lectures from parents and seasoned travelers the world over. It also seems like the kind of thing a person tasked with securing our homeland should know.

The Department of Homeland Security’s attempt to justify the behavior only compounds the mystery: A spokesperson told CNN that Noem’s children and grandchildren were in town for the White House Easter egg roll, and she was “using the withdrawal to treat her family to dinner, activities, and Easter gifts”—all normal expenses that could be easily put on a credit card. Think of the points!

If I try, I can come up with some reasons why Noem might prefer carrying around a gigantic wad of bills, but each seems more absurd than the last. Maybe she was trying to keep undercover and avoid using a card with her name on it, lest she become the target of an embarrassing showdown with liberal restaurant employees. Maybe she was trying to prove the Republican canard that D.C. is a cesspool of urban grime and crime, flashing handfuls of cash and waiting for an opportunistic thief to pounce. It’s worth noting that the DHS itself considers carrying a lot of cash to be uncommon enough to arouse suspicion of criminal activity: A DHS report used to justify the deportation of Kilmar Abrego Garcia (to the Salvadoran prison where Noem appeared in her Rolex) by tying him to MS-13 noted that he had $1,178 on him when he was arrested.

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Noem is known for behavior that most reasonable adults would consider bizarr­e­—remember the 1-year-old dog she executed in a gravel pit for being “untrainable”? But her equally bizarre cash stash looks much more explicable when you consider two other peculiar items she had in her handbag: her passport and a set of blank checks. If it’s strange to bring $3,000 to a burger joint, it’s completely incomprehensible for a government official to be carrying her passport around D.C. on a family visit. And who uses checks for anything but rent these days? Taken together, the contents of this stolen purse sound less like what you might find in an average pocketbook and more like what someone might store in a go-bag. Does Noem fear the possibility of an impending indictment—or, dare I say, a coup—that would force her to flee the country at a moment’s notice? Could be! With her meds, her cash, and her makeup bag, she’d be ready for life as an official in exile. But with all the vigilance and forethought it takes to prepare for such an eventuality, you’d think she’d keep a closer eye on her purse.

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