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| Version 0 | Version 1 |
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| Trump threatens to scrap emergency agency Fema | Trump threatens to scrap emergency agency Fema |
| (about 7 hours later) | |
| President tours hurricane-damaged areas of North Carolina and says: ‘I think we’re going to recommend Fema go away’ | President tours hurricane-damaged areas of North Carolina and says: ‘I think we’re going to recommend Fema go away’ |
| Donald Trump toured the devastation from the fires that have ravaged Los Angeles for a third week on Friday, the second stop on a national disaster recovery tour that began in North Carolina, where he vowed to “fundamentally reform” or potentially eliminate the Federal Emergency Management Agency. | |
| Arriving in Los Angeles, the president was greeted on the tarmac by the California governor, Gavin Newsom, a longtime political rival. But the men set aside their differences during the visit. | |
| “We’re going to need your support. We’re going to need your help,” Newsom said, after thanking Trump for making the visit. “You were there for us during COVID – I don’t forget that – and I have all the expectations that we’ll be able to work together to get this speedy recovery.” | |
| “We want to get it fixed. We want to get the problem fixed,” Trump told reporters after exiting Air Force One. “And there will be some ways. It’s like you got hit by a bomb.” | |
| After an aerial tour of the devastation, Trump and the first lady, Melania Trump, walked the fire zone and met with families who had lost their homes in the Palisades Fire. | |
| Speaking to reporters earlier in Asheville, where he surveyed the devastation from Hurricane Helene, Trump called Fema “not good” and “a disaster” and suggested the agency was no longer effective at responding to natural emergencies. | |
| “I think we’re going to recommend that Fema go away,” he told reporters. | |
| During a press briefing aboard Air Force One, White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt said the president planned to sign an executive order that would establish “a council of FEMA advisers to look at the agency and root out the corruption, the incompetence and the bureaucracy”. | |
| Should the order come to be, the new task force reportedly would formalize Trump’s desire to redirect more disaster-management responsibilities and federal funding to state governments – signalling serious intent to potentially reshape the agency’s role in national disaster response. | |
| The tour comes four months after Hurricane Helene devastated Buncombe county, where 42 people were killed and local damage is estimated at over $50bn. Trump received a briefing on recovery efforts and met with affected families during his visit. | The tour comes four months after Hurricane Helene devastated Buncombe county, where 42 people were killed and local damage is estimated at over $50bn. Trump received a briefing on recovery efforts and met with affected families during his visit. |
| Fema, with an annual budget in the tens of billions of dollars and more than 20,000 employees, would need congressional approval to be shuttered. | Fema, with an annual budget in the tens of billions of dollars and more than 20,000 employees, would need congressional approval to be shuttered. |