President Trump talked a big game on the campaign about what he deemed an ineffective response by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) during hurricane season last year. In fact, during a trip to North Carolina in January, he made a point to criticize the Biden administration’s response to Hurricane Helene, saying, “This is totally unacceptable, and I’ll be taking strong action.” 

Turns out that “strong action” would be telling the state, “Nah fam, you on your own.” 

According to ABC News, FEMA has rejected a request from the North Carolina governor to continue matching state funds for efforts in cleaning up the damage left by Hurricane Helene. The Biden administration issued a cost-sharing directive last fall to match 100% of the funds the state spends on cleanup operations. Hurricane Helene was a Category 4 storm that killed over 230 people and resulted in record flooding throughout the state. 

“After a careful and thorough review of all the information available, including that contained in your initial request for a cost share adjustment and appeal, we have concluded that an extension of the 100 percent federal cost share for debris removal and emergency protective measures, including direct federal assistance for an additional 180 days under major disaster declaration FEMA-4827-DR is not warranted,” acting Administrator David Richardson wrote in the letter.

Richardson is…an interesting fellow, to put it politely. A former Marine, he was named the acting director of FEMA despite having no experience managing natural disasters. In his initial remarks to the agency, he warned he would “run right over” any person who doesn’t agree with the changes being made to how FEMA operates. 

His appointment seems to be yet another instance of the Trump administration valuing blind loyalty over an innate ability to do critical jobs. This isn’t even speculation, as Richardson more or less confirmed this when he told FEMA employees, “I will achieve the president’s intent. I am as bent on achieving the president’s intent as I was on making sure that I did my duty when I took my Marines to Iraq.” 

Over the last several months, the Trump administration has made overtures to drastically reduce FEMA’s responsibilities, if not kill the agency outright. Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem revealed early this month that “The president has indicated he wants to eliminate FEMA as it exists today and to have states have more control over their emergency management response.” 

“He wants to empower local governments and support them and how they respond to their people,” Noem added. What makes this all the more concerning is that there isn’t a clear plan in place for how disaster response will be handled on the federal level, with many states simply not having the funding to handle disaster response at the scale often necessary. 

“For a state like North Carolina, it’s significant. And in a state like Alabama or Mississippi, it would bankrupt the state,” Michael Coen, chief of staff at FEMA during the Biden administration, told NBC News. “They would have to take out a bond. They would have to look at how they increase tax revenue. For some of these states, it might be twice what their annual budget is for the year.”

North Carolina isn’t the only place having to deal with the consequences of the ongoing dismantling of FEMA. Earlier this month, FEMA revoked $1 billion in funding for flood prevention projects in Maryland, Washington, D.C., and Pennsylvania, calling the initiatives “wasteful and ineffective,” but didn’t provide any evidence as to how. St. Louis is still waiting on federal assistance to help rebuild after a tornado swept through the city earlier this month. 

In quite a literal sense, this is another example of when it rains for white America, it floods for Black folks. In North Carolina alone, Black people are the second largest demographic in the state and were greatly affected by the flooding that came as a result of Hurricane Helene. These moves by FEMA place already vulnerable communities even more at risk. 

Climate events already disproportionately affect Black communities, especially in low-income areas with poor infrastructure. The previous Trump administration already gave us a preview of how these moves will likely turn out when it doled out federal funds to help a predominately white town in the wake of a tornado while Black communities were left high and dry. 

Hurricane and tornado seasons will only continue to worsen as the planet continues to heat up, and the effects are only going to be compounded by the Trump administration’s active rejection of climate measures. But of course, none of that matters to Trump as long as FEMA is “achieving his intent.”

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