ICYMI: CNN — "Power Struggles and Paralysis: Inside FEMA's Lost Year as Storm Season Approaches"
WASHINGTON, D.C. — One day into hurricane season, new reporting from CNN exposes the chaos that consumed FEMA over the past year under the Trump administration — confirming everything Sabotaging Our Safety has been documenting.
The deep dive, based on interviews with more than 50 FEMA insiders, details how political infighting, partisan favoritism, and willful incompetence hollowed out the nation's emergency management agency. The reporting validates SOS's core findings: FEMA is underprepared, understaffed, and entering disaster season significantly weakened.
"Americans living in hurricane-prone communities deserve a federal emergency management system that shows up — not one that skipped training, had its workforce gutted, and is left with half its leadership chairs empty before the first storm of the season," said Sabotaging Our Safety Advisory Council member Rafael Lemaitre. "Today marks the start of hurricane season and is a stark reminder that If a major hurricane makes landfall this year, the gaps Donald Trump created through negligence and politicization of disaster relief will have real consequences for real people."
Among the key revelations:
FEMA was sitting on more than $15 billion in unspent disaster funds at the end of last year — money stalled for political reasons while communities waited for help. Noem and her team blocked funds from blue states while fast-tracking money to political allies. Even Republican lawmakers revolted, with North Carolina's senators publicly condemning the delays and blocking DHS nominees until aid finally moved.
Roughly 20% of FEMA's workforce is gone. Most of the agency's senior career leadership has been driven out. FEMA has cycled through four acting administrators and still has no confirmed leader as hurricane season opens.
FEMA is not prepared for disaster season. As one senior FEMA official told CNN: "It could take a decade to fix what they broke. And if we have a major disaster this year, we're screwed."
SOS has been tracking FEMA's collapse for over a year. Read the FEMA Readiness Scorecard — which gave the agency failing grades across every critical dimension.
###
