Cameron Hamilton was appointed to lead FEMA at the start of the second Trump administration in January 2025. Early reports said he drafted a memo titled “Abolishing FEMA,” and that Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem required him to take a polygraph after the memo leaked. Congress questioned him, and he was publicly fired. After his departure, two acting administrators followed, and one left soon afterward. A year later, Hamilton was nominated to lead FEMA permanently. Meanwhile, FEMA faced additional pressure from proposed Trump-linked reforms, including raising the threshold for federal disaster recovery involvement and shrinking the National Flood Insurance Program, potentially leaving states responsible for most disaster fixes.
"Cameron Hamilton was appointed to run the Federal Emergency Management Agency when the second Trump administration began in January 2025. From the start, there were reasons to feel like Hamilton's tenure was fraught. There were reports that Hamilton had drafted a memo for his bosses titled " Abolishing FEMA." But there were also reports that Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem forced Hamilton to get a polygraph after news about the whole abolishing FEMA thing leaked to the press."
"Congress had questions about all this and called on Hamilton to answer a few, and he ended up being publicly fired. After he left, there were two more acting FEMA administrators. One just left-not exactly a sign of strength at an agency that you might not think about at all until you really need it. A year later, Hamilton is having a comeback. He has been nominated to lead FEMA permanently."
"Mary Harris: Last week we got this look at what Donald Trump wants to do to FEMA. It was a report by this council of experts picked by Trump. It outlines recommendations to overhaul FEMA. The big ones are raising the threshold for the federal government to get involved in disaster recovery and shrinking the National Flood Insurance Program. It really makes clear that the responsibility for fixing a natural disaster is mostly going to fall on the states."
#fema #disaster-recovery #national-flood-insurance-program #homeland-security #federal-emergency-management
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