President Donald Trump signaled he is considering sweeping changes to the Federal Emergency Management Agency, the country’s lead federal agency responsible for disaster relief, during his second term in the White House.
During his first one-on-one interview since assuming office, Trump told Fox News’s Sean Hannity that he wanted states to have the power to manage their own disaster relief efforts rather than be overseen by the federal government, accusing FEMA of “complicating everything.”
“FEMA is going to be a whole big discussion very shortly because I’d rather see the states take care of their own problems,” the president said on Wednesday. “I love Oklahoma, but you know what? If they get hit with a tornado or something, let Oklahoma fix it … then the federal government can help them out with the money. FEMA is getting in the way of everything, and the Democrats actually used FEMA not to help North Carolina.”
FEMA has experienced close scrutiny in recent months for its response to Hurricane Helene, which most prominently hit western North Carolina, leaving the region a shell of its former self. Trump led critics in arguing FEMA had led an ineffective, bureaucratic response to the crisis that had, in some cases, stonewalled relief efforts spearheaded by the private sector. He also denounced FEMA for spending roughly $1 billion of its resources to shelter illegal immigrants when agency officials signaled last fall it was running out of money in its disaster relief fund. FEMA officials denounced all allegations as misinformation.
Trump’s statement on his vision for the agency’s future came during a discussion about what might be included in legislation pushing his priorities through Congress. He announced during his interview that he wanted to ensure ample funds earmarked for the Los Angeles fires are contained in the bill, noting that the measure would gain bipartisan support.
When Hannity suggested that money also be allocated to North Carolinians struggling to recover from Hurricane Helene, Trump implied that Democrats wouldn’t be on board with the idea. He said they didn’t care about the people in the state and had backed an ineffective response to Helene through FEMA.
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“The Democrats don’t care about North Carolina. What they’ve done with FEMA is so bad. FEMA is a whole other discussion because all it does is complicate everything. FEMA has not done their job for the last four years,” he said. “You know, I had FEMA working really well. We had hurricanes in Florida. We had Alabama tornadoes. But unless you have certain types of leadership, it really, it gets in the way.”
Since former President Jimmy Carter created FEMA in 1979, it has become a massive federal agency with a budget of $29.5 billion in fiscal 2023. That year, it responded to more than 100 disasters, handed out $1.3 billion to disaster survivors, and gave nearly $12 billion to states to rebuild.