States To Face Natural Disasters Alone

 

The Malignant Fascist's regime has ostensibly declared war on its own people, as they face a summer of tornadoes, floods, hurricanes and fires.  His gutting of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and plans to shift responsibility for responding to natural disasters to the ill-prepared States is causing major concerns, as ProPublica reports:

"Upheaval at the nation’s top disaster agency is raising anxiety among state and local emergency managers — and leaving major questions about the whereabouts of billions of federal dollars it pays out to them.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency still has not opened applications for an enormous suite of grants, including ones that many states rely on to pay for basic emergency management operations. Some states pass on much of that money to their most rural, low-income counties to ensure they have an emergency manager on the payroll.

FEMA has blown through the mid-May statutory deadline to start the grants’ application process, according to the National Emergency Management Association, with no word about why or what that might indicate. The delay appears to have little precedent." (our emphasis)

"Rural, low income counties" contain the core of the MF's base, and while the strong temptation is to say "FAFO," the MF's reckless policy will inevitably affect other communities, specifically those of color and in coastal areas whose demographics aren't especially Trumpist.  Agricultural and other resource losses will affect a broader community, too.  More from ProPublica's report:

"In April, the agency abruptly rescinded a different grant program that county and local governments were expecting to help them reduce natural hazard risks moving forward. The clawback of money included hundreds of millions already pledged. FEMA also quietly withdrew a notice for states to apply for $600 million in flood mitigation grants.

On top of that, on June 11, U.S. Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem began requiring that she review all FEMA grants above $100,000. That could slow its vast multibillion grants apparatus to a crawl, current and former FEMA employees said." (our emphasis)

We know that HHS Secretary Cosplay Barbie will do her best to take the MF's cruelty and recklessness to the limits in order to impress him, as she has with her ICE goons.  In the meantime, the full dismantlement of FEMA has been promised by the MF starting this fall after hurricane season, but not before other natural disasters have hit and have destroyed communities that will have, at best, a diminished FEMA to rely on.

(photo: States can kiss this response goodbye. Eduardo Martinez / FEMA)

 

With Hurricane Season Coming, FEMA Is Shrinking

Today marks the start of hurricane season and this year, under the regime of the Malignant Fascist, the U.S. may be less prepared to handle the impacts than ever, thanks to cuts in budget and staff.  The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has also predicted more storms in the 2025 season than average.  From the Associated Press:

"Experts are alarmed over the large-scale staff reductions, travel and training restrictions and grant cut-offs since President Donald Trump took office at both the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which prepares for and responds to hurricanes, and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, which tracks and forecasts them.

'My nightmare is a major catastrophic storm hitting an area that is reeling from the impact of all of this nonsense from the Trump administration and people will die. And that could happen in Florida, that could happen in Texas, that could happen in South Carolina,' said Susan Cutter, the director of the Hazards and Vulnerability Research Institute at the University of South Carolina. [snip]

About 2,000 full-time staff have left FEMA since Trump took office in January, a loss of roughly one-third of the agency’s full-time workforce, amid Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) mandated cuts. Scholars who study emergency management are concerned by both the reduction in capacity and the 'brain drain' of experienced staff.

'There’s really been a brain drain within FEMA in addition to the loss of overall employees,' said Samantha Montano, who teaches emergency management at the Massachusetts Maritime Academy. She noted that many who left were in critical management positions." (our emphasis)

The MF's half-baked idea is to shift responsibility for disaster recovery and costs from FEMA to the States, which, in the case of hurricanes, are heavily MAGAt along the Gulf Coast, and the Atlantic Coast from Florida to North Carolina.  States say they haven't budgeted for major disaster relief.  More from the article:

"The feds often pick up the entire bill in big disasters and most of it in smaller ones. In the Trump administration, disaster declarations have been denied or delayed. When disaster declarations were issued for nine states last week, some had been pending for two months and others were only partially approved.

'We’ve just relied on FEMA for so much for so long and not knowing who’s going to fill the gap and how we’re going to fill it is really scary,' said University at Albany emergency management professor Jeannette Sutton." (our emphasis)

What's even scarier are the MAGAt voters who didn't see this coming from a narcissistic sociopath that they elected on the Project 2025 platform.  Perhaps now they'll connect the dots, but it's a long shot.  FAFO.