FEMA's Texas Response 'the Exception' as Backlog Grows Under Trump

Two days after torrential rains set off fatal flash flooding in the Texas Hill Country, President Donald Trump authorized staff at the Federal Emergency Management Agency to travel to the flood zone to help state and local officials begin the rebuilding process.

But that quick response, following widespread media coverage of a disaster that claimed at least 134 lives and left 100 people missing, marked a sharp shift in approach since Trump took office in January, experts say.

As natural disasters like flooding, tornadoes and landslides piled up across the country this spring, FEMA accumulated a backlog of disaster requests that is still lingering as the Gulf of Mexico's hurricane season gets underway.

Currently, five states including Indiana, Oregon and Maryland are awaiting a federal response more than a month after they requested a federal disaster declaration to unlock funds and other critical resources.

"You're waiting weeks, sometimes months to have your disasters declared," said Sarah Labowitz, a senior fellow at the non-profit Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. "Texas is the exception, not the rule."

FEMA, which is overseen by Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, declined to comment for this story. But the Trump administration has repeatedly questioned FEMA's necessity in managing emergency response to natural disasters, at one point saying they were going to eliminate the agency before taking a softer tone following the Texas floods this month.

"We want FEMA to work well," Russell Vought, director of the Office of Management and Budget, told reporters earlier this month. "And, you know, the president is going to continue to be asking tough questions from all of his agencies."

Disaster declarations are necessary to allow the release of federal disaster funds that do everything from giving survivors money to buy food and other necessities and begin large-scale debris removal.

In the two weeks leading up to hurricane season, which began on June 1, FEMA had an average of almost 13 disaster requests pending each day, compared to an average of four during that same period over the previous nine years, according to analysis of federal data by Carnegie.

The backlog comes amid mass firings and departures that have resulted in a 20% decrease in FEMA staff, according to an op-ed by MaryAnn Tierney, the former Region 3 administrator for FEMA.

"Thousands of temporary employees remain on the job, but their contracts are running out. These are people trained to work with disaster survivors. FEMA cannot replace them or bring in new talent because of hiring restrictions," she wrote.

Tierney, along with Region 6 Administrator Tony Robinson who covered Texas and four other states, were among a wave of senior FEMA officials who left the agency in recent months, amid what critics have characterized as a "brain drain" at the agency.

That has left some wondering how FEMA will manage once hurricane season gets into full swing later this summer.

"When you lose that expertise it means you don’t have the knowledge about what's possible and how to cut through the red tape," said Caitlin Durkovich, the former deputy homeland security advisor for resilience and response during the Biden administration. "These are people experiencing the worst day of their lives. They have nothing left. They're lucky if they have a phone. And when you delay approval it's delaying money going to people when they need it most."

In Missouri, officials waited more than a month for FEMA assistance after a tornado struck St. Louis in May, killing five people. In West Virginia, which is still waiting for a response from its June 20 request for FEMA assistance, torrential rains caused rivers to overflow their banks, flooding dozens of homes and businesses and killing nine people.

Even when FEMA officials are on the ground, they no longer have the freedom to order up cleanup crews and debris removal contractors as they once did. Under new Trump administration rules, they must get clearance from Noem to move ahead on all contracts over $100,000.

An investigation by The New York Times revealed that on July 6 and July 7, as the Guadalupe River swamped residents' homes and children’s camps, thousands of calls to FEMA call centers went unanswered after hundreds of contractors were laid off when their contracts expired July 5.

Noem denied the policy had resulted in delays, saying on NBC's Meet the Press that Homeland Security had resources in Texas "just an hour or two after the flooding."

Within the agency, employees have grown weary of taking action that might attract the attention of the administration, said Rafael Lemaitre, a former FEMA spokesman during the Obama administration. He said former colleagues had described a "crisis of fear and paralysis at the agency."

"You can understand how that culture of fear has stopped employees from making the decisions they're supposed to make," he said. "You'd rather stay quiet and err on the side of inaction."