{
"type": "rich",
"version": "1.0",
"provider_name": "Action Network",
"provider_url": "https://actionnetwork.org",
"html": "",
"author_name": "National Campaign for Justice",
"author_url": "https://actionnetwork.org/groups/just-strategy",
"title": "Urge the bipartisan National Governors Association to oppose",
"thumbnail_url": "https://actionnetwork.org//images/generic_facebook.jpg",
"description": "Always seeking a way to do less to help, President Trump has begun to muse about shutting down the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and turning over the burden of responsibility for disaster relief to the states. FEMA’s role already is to provide a backstop to local and state officials’ management of events. But shutting down the agency altogether is a recipe for chaos. As the Los Angeles wildfires continued to burn this week, Trump said, “When you have a problem like this, I think you want to go, whether it’s a Democrat or Republican governor, you want to use your state to fix it. I think we’re going to recommend that FEMA go away and we pay directly -- we pay a percentage to the state. The state should fix it.” Apparently, “I alone can fix it” applies only to Trump’s agenda for increasing the wealth of the oligarchy. He has repeatedly threatened to withhold federal aid for California for the current disasters, using his misunderstanding of California water policies to blame the Democratic governor for the quick spread of fires through parched chaparral under high winds. Ironically, however, his plans would harm some Trump-loving southern states even more than the west coast. “FEMA is getting in the way of everything,” Trump said, discussing Oklahoma: “If they get hit with a tornado or something, let Oklahoma fix it. You don’t need -- and then the federal government can help them out with the money.” As Trump looks to hand off responsibility to the states, we must look to the bipartisan National Governors Association (NGA) to head up the pushback to these regressive schemes. The NGA describes their role as enabling governors to “work together across party lines to confront common challenges and shape federal policy” through bipartisan dialogue, policy innovation, information-sharing, and establishing bipartisan policy priorities. According to Pete Gaynor, who served as FEMA administrator from 2019 to 2021, the problem with shifting responsibility to the states is that they vary in their ability to respond. He said only a dozen or so states, such as Florida, Texas, and California, have the staff, funding, and experience needed to manage big disasters. Some states like the idea of receiving block grants from FEMA for disaster assistance, says Lynn Budd, director of the Wyoming Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Management. Wyoming, with its small population and infrequent disasters, can’t afford to keep a large staff on hand to handle disasters within the state. But Biden’s FEMA administrator, Deanne Criswell, says she is concerned that states without the expertise or resources to handle a recovery would just fail to rebuild, with the result they would be even more vulnerable to the next disaster. Don’t let Trump get away with abdicating the federal government’s role in disaster response. Urge the National Governors Association to oppose Trump’s plan to shut down the Federal Emergency Management Agency now.>>>",
"url": "https://actionnetwork.org/letters/oppose-trumps-plan-to-shutdown-fema"
}