On Monday’s broadcast of the Fox News Channel’s “Fox & Friends,” DHS Secretary Kristi Noem stated that the response to the floods in Texas “is exactly what President Trump has envisioned for FEMA” and stated that local officials have run the response and FEMA was there to plug the gaps and give a disaster declaration.
Co-host Emily Compagno asked, “Madam Secretary, you stood next to the President as he talked about dismantling FEMA in favor of greater autonomy and targeted resources under the control of state and local officials. Does this tragic situation underscore that need for you, or does that change that dynamic of what would work best moving forward?”
Noem answered, “I think what we’ve seen here is exactly what President Trump has envisioned for FEMA, is, immediately allowing the state to do the response and supporting them in every way that they can. So, this response was driven by Gov. Abbott (R) and his emergency management director and the local officials that were on the ground and we were immediately there to fill in the gaps where they needed and to give them their disaster declaration as soon as possible, which happened, almost immediately, as soon as the Governor asked. That’s the FEMA and how it should operate, rather than how it operated under the Biden administration and previous administrations, where it was slow to respond, slow to get resources there. We already have emergency response teams on the ground that have been there from the very beginning and then we want to empower the states to do the response that’s necessary to best serve their people. So, the FEMA that President Trump wants in place is one that takes care of people, but also empowers those people who live in those communities that know how best to respond to have the authority to do so.”
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