“This is politicization of grant funds and disaster assistance like we’ve never seen before,” a second FEMA official told CNN.
Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders and the state’s entire GOP congressional delegation are urging President Donald Trump to reconsider after the Federal Emergency Management denied the state’s request for federal disaster relief following a series of deadly storms last month.
After severe storms hit the state in mid-March, Sanders applied for disaster relief through FEMA, under what’s known as a major disaster declaration. The request was denied.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency’s new thing is to deny obviously needed support to disaster-struck areas, even where a Republican is in charge. It is producing some… interesting responses.
“Despite today’s notification, I am grateful to the Trump Administration for their strong support for southern West Virginia’s recovery following the February floods,” said West Virginia governor Patrick Morrisey, in a statement on Tuesday. The flooding in question killed multiple people, and the recovery from them has been slow, with officials on the ground still asking for help months later. To be fair to Morrisey, FEMA did previously approve assistance requests for some West Virginia counties — but not a bunch of others.
The “thank you sir may I have another” sort of answer from the governor isn’t playing that well at home. “Instead of fighting to defend you, Governor Morrisey released a statement doing what he knows best—puckering up to the current administration,” said the state House minority Whip Shawn Fluharty.
A federal judge on Friday ruled that the Trump administration had violated his order to halt sweeping freezes to federal funding by withholding Federal Emergency Management Agency funds to at least 19 states.
It seemed to be a “covert” effort to punish states with so-called sanctuary laws for immigrants, the judge said.
In March, U.S. District Judge John McConnell issued a preliminary injunction in favor of 23 states that sued the government over its plan to implement a broad pause to state aid. The Barack Obama appointee ruled that the plan “fundamentally undermines the distinct constitutional roles of each branch of our government,” and ordered the Trump administration to “immediately end any funding pause” until further notice.
But on Friday, McConnell found the Trump administration in breach of the court’s order. At least 19 states — all with Democratic attorney generals, and all of which had sued to stop the funding cuts — “presented undisputed evidence” that they were not receiving congressionally approved FEMA funding from the federal government, the judge ruled.
Oregon claimed that more than $120 million in disaster relief assistance for winter storms, flooding, landslides, wildfires and flood mitigation remains frozen by FEMA. Hawaii said that the agency still hasn’t answered a roughly $6 million request for aid to rebuild after the 2023 wildfires in Maui.
At a time when critical funding from the Federal Emergency Management Agency has slowed to a crawl, some states — with Republican governors — have been luckier than others in prying money loose.
The Trump administration directed FEMA to prioritize payments to GOP-led Missouri and Virginia in recent weeks, while some other states’ requests weren’t being filled, according to multiple sources and internal communications obtained by CNN.
The situation has raised concerns at FEMA that the White House is playing politics with critical emergency management funds. President Donald Trump and his allies have criticized FEMA for months as partisan, ineffective and unnecessary. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem has said she will “eliminate FEMA” altogether.
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FEMA staff first received orders to prioritize payments for Missouri, after state officials warned the Department of Homeland Security that they would have to lay off state emergency management personnel if the funds didn’t arrive quickly, according to internal emails obtained by CNN.
Homeland security officials forwarded Missouri’s request to FEMA, and within 24 hours, the agency’s acting administrator instructed staff to start paying the state. At the time, extremely little money was getting out of FEMA, multiple sources tell CNN.
“Today, is there a way we can focus on payments to Missouri specifically and clear these out?” acting FEMA Administrator Cameron Hamilton, a Trump appointee, told agency personnel in an email, which CNN obtained.
In the memo, Hamilton wrote that Missouri Gov. Mike Kehoe and Sen. Eric Schmitt had been notified the payments would commence and were “extremely glad to hear it.” Both Kehoe and Schmitt are Republicans.
In the weeks that followed, Missouri began receiving various previously paused grants, even as other states were forced to wait for a range of FEMA funds – including, in some cases, disaster assistance – multiple sources tell CNN.
The episode alarmed some FEMA officials who had never experienced such a wide-reaching funding pause at the agency, as other states and locales pushed for their own funding to be cleared. Multiple officials, speaking to CNN anonymously out of fear of retribution, said the money for Missouri was not assistance for any recent disaster and seemed no more urgent than the paused payments to other states.
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Yet some inside FEMA argue the unfreezing of federal funding goes beyond leveraging working relationships.
“This is politicization of grant funds and disaster assistance like we’ve never seen before,” a second FEMA official told CNN.
Where is their god? Why does the government have to bail them out?
FWIW, the Washington state bomb cyclone took place during Biden’s term.