Publicly, Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem has said the Federal Emergency Management Agency needs to be reoriented or even done away with altogether.
“We are eliminating FEMA,” Noem said at a televised meeting of President Donald Trump’s Cabinet in March.
According to a report by the Government Accountability Office, FEMA had 8,802 total CORE employees as of fiscal year 2022.
Three sources familiar with Noem’s recent actions say she has taken an outsized role compared with previous secretaries in pushing the White House to support FEMA and reimburse states.
ET): An earlier version of this article misspelled the last name of a former FEMA chief of staff.
Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem has stated publicly that the Federal Emergency Management Agency should be refocused or eliminated completely.
At a March televised Cabinet meeting of President Donald Trump, Noem declared, “We are eliminating FEMA.”.
However, sources familiar with the matter told NBC News that Noem has been quietly working behind the scenes to approve reimbursements to states that have already been affected by disasters and to retain key employees as hurricane season approaches.
Shortly after taking office for a second term, Trump himself discussed the possibility of “getting rid of” FEMA while visiting parts of North Carolina that had been impacted by Hurricane Helene. Although Cameron Hamilton, the administration’s first acting FEMA administrator, was fired a day after testifying before a congressional hearing that he did not believe “it is in the best interests of the American people to eliminate” FEMA, there has been no public indication that his administration, including Noem, is changing their mind. Speaking to NBC News, Department of Homeland Security spokesperson Tricia McLaughlin stated that the action was not a reaction to his testimony.
There does, however, appear to be some internal recognition that, absent a plan ready for how the country would move forward without FEMA, important elements of the agency and its work have to remain in place for now.
Internal documents obtained by NBC News show that on May 19, Noem granted a request by recently appointed acting FEMA Administrator David Richardson to keep 2,652 workers whose contracts were due to expire between April and December. The staff members are members of FEMA’s Cadre of On-Call Response/Recovery Employees (CORE) group, which hires personnel for fixed durations of two to four years. If they had left this year, FEMA would have been severely short-staffed during hurricane season. The Government Accountability Office reported that as of fiscal year 2022, FEMA employed 8,802 people in total who worked as CORE.
According to a FEMA employee who spoke to NBC News, the staff appeared both surprised and happy that Noem chose to retain the CORE staff during hurricane season after the administration had taken steps to reduce them.
The White House abruptly approved disaster recovery reimbursement requests from 10 states, some of which had been stalled for months, the same week that FEMA was taking steps to retain those key employees. According to FEMA disaster approval data online, this accounted for 20% of all such approvals during Trump’s second term.
Noem has played a more significant role than previous secretaries in pressuring the White House to assist FEMA and reimburse states, according to three people familiar with her recent actions.
According to a statute, the federal government must reimburse state and local governments for seventy-five percent of their disaster-related expenses. Anything over that is decided by a set formula or, in the event that the formula’s conditions are not satisfied, by the president. In the past, the White House generally approved what FEMA officials determined was appropriate based on those formulas, leaving the homeland security secretary to function largely as a rubber stamp, according to two sources familiar with the disaster approval process. According to one of the people familiar with Noem’s recent actions, however, the White House had consistently resisted FEMA’s recommendations in an effort to reduce the agency’s role and encourage more states to bail themselves out, at least as of last week. Noem had also become involved.
“This is a sad attempt by the mainstream media to drive a false narrative that there is daylight between President Trump and Secretary Noem,” said DHS spokesperson McLaughlin in a statement when asked for comment on the article. To the dismay of the press, there isn’t. President Trump’s plan for FEMA’s future, which calls for moving the agency away from a dysfunctional, Washington-based bureaucracy that has failed the American people, has been carried out by Secretary Noem. “.”.
States may not be able to bear the cost if they haven’t prepared for it years in advance, as prior administrations usually approved reimbursements that FEMA established should be made.
It is noteworthy for a state such as North Carolina. Furthermore, it would bankrupt a state like Alabama or Mississippi, according to Michael Coen, the former chief of staff at FEMA under the Biden administration. A bond would need to be removed. They would need to consider how they raise tax income. In certain states, it may be double the amount of their yearly budget. Therefore, when the White House or DHS secretary says that states will need to take responsibility for the issue, do not believe it. These states’ approaches to budgeting will need to change. “.”.
Even though the CORE staff is being retained, many of FEMA’s top executives have departed this year, mostly on their own volition, which has raised questions about the agency’s capacity to respond during hurricane season both internally and among congressional members and outside observers. An internal email last week announced the departure of sixteen senior officials with a combined 228 years of FEMA experience. On Wednesday, the acting chief of staff at FEMA, who is also expected to resign, sent out an email announcing the departure of four more senior executives.
According to the FEMA employee, “it’s like having a relay team, but instead of having six members, you only have four, and yeah, you can do it, but those four runners are going to have to run more than they’re trained for.”.
EDITED (May 29, 2025, 10:04 p.m. M. ET): The last name of a former FEMA chief of staff was misspelled in an earlier draft of this article. Not Cohen, but Michael Coen.
