Top House Democrats want assurances from the Trump administration that cuts to the Federal Emergency Management Agency won’t stifle the government’s ability to respond to the imminent hurricane season.
Rep. Bennie Thompson, the ranking member in the Committee on Homeland Security, sent a strongly worded letter Wednesday to Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem with questions he claims she had an “inability to answer” during this month’s budget hearings.
“I asked you about your desire to ‘eliminate’ FEMA and what plans DHS or FEMA has for responding to catastrophic disasters as the United States heads into hurricane season if FEMA is subject to ‘dramatic reforms,’ as you put it,” Thompson wrote in his letter to Noem. “You testified that DHS and FEMA have no plans.”