Secretary Noem’s Reckless Undermining of FEMA As Well As Her Destructive DHS Agenda Means She Must Go
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Under the Trump Administration and the leadership of Secretary Kristi Noem, the US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has undeniably come to represent a dangerous threat to people’s security and lives. While the cruel and destructive agenda of DHS is directed by the administration, Secretary Noem is implementing that agenda through flagrant lies, inflammatory rhetoric, and the empowerment of violent agency leadership which have fueled chaos, spread terror, and enabled murder in the streets of American communities. In addition, she has taken steps to shrink and possibly dissolve Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), an agency the US relies on before and after disasters. For these reasons, The Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) is calling for Secretary Noem to go.
Secretary Noem’s incompetence is making life significantly harder for millions of people by making FEMA less prepared to confront increasingly more frequent and intense extreme weather and climate-fueled disasters, while she also wages an all-out assault on immigrant communities and those who defend them.
As UCS President Gretchen Goldman noted in her recent statement, it’s important for Congress to hold the administration and Noem accountable for the ongoing violence and death in Minneapolis and elsewhere and not allow any further funding for the DHS’s ICE operations in the current appropriations process without safeguards for people in place.
Noem’s departure would be an important first step, but much more is needed from Congress to put a stop to the Trump administration’s ruthless and destructive actions to undermine FEMA and endanger people across the country.
While Secretary Noem has already done incredible damage, her removal likely won’t stop President Trump’s plans to further dismantle FEMA and politicize disaster aid. The latest example is the executive order on the California wildfires which in an unprecedented move would allow the federal government to preempt state and local building laws and regulations and potentially recoup hazard mitigation funding. The call for Secretary Noem’s removal should focus Congress’ and the public’s attention on the vital role the agency plays and what’s needed to restore FEMA and stave off future plans to continue to dismantle the agency. So, what should this look like in the near-term?
Congressional oversight of FEMA
Above all, Congress must take seriously its oversight role to ensure that the agency delivers on its critical, life-saving mission to protect the public.
FEMA’s role is becoming more crucial as climate change magnifies extreme weather events including floods, storms, and wildfires that leave communities reeling. FEMA needs to be fully staffed and funded for the benefit of people who end up in harm’s way.
FEMA fully funded
Congress should continue its work on bipartisan legislation to fund FEMA. The FEMA Fiscal Year 2026 discretionary appropriations bill provides roughly $32 billion for the agency. Notably, this is an overall increase of about $4.7 billion over FY25 enacted levels and an 18% increase to FEMA’s operational budget which was flat in 2025 and is critical to covering staff salaries, logistics, and training.
While the Disaster Relief Fund (DRF) covers disaster response, recovery and preparedness and includes $26.4 billion, this is an increase of $3.8 billion above FY25 levels. Congress has also included numerous FEMA requirements in the appropriations bill that are very welcome and critical pushbacks to the Trump administration’s attacks, including that FEMA must:
- Maintain staffing levels sufficient to fulfill the missions required under federal law;
- Not close any of its 10 regional offices; and
- Not implement any portion of the FEMA review council plan without an act of Congress.
Re-establish FEMA as a cabinet-level agency
There is no doubt that FEMA could benefit from modernization, such as some of the policies included in the Fixing Emergency Management for Americans Act of 2025 or the FEMA Act. However, in the interim, Congress should pass stand-alone legislation to re-establish FEMA as a cabinet-level agency unencumbered by DHS. With a more direct line to the president, the FEMA administrator can reduce red tape, increase advocacy on important budget investments and policy issues, and help reduce the amount of coordination needed by state and local officials trying to resolve local level issues.
Nominate qualified DHS Secretary, FEMA administrator
Congress must also ensure that the Trump administration nominates a qualified DHS Secretary and FEMA administrator as soon as possible once Noem is dismissed.
DHS is the third largest federal agency with more than 240,000 employees and a $178 billion budget. Secretary Noem’s lack of specialized expertise was noted by many, as was her far-right extremist rhetoric during the nomination process. Unsurprisingly, under Noem’s watch, FEMA has been led by a series of unqualified acting chiefs ranging from slightly knowledgeable Cameron Hamilton, to extremely incompetent David Richardson to the “enforcer” Karen Evans, not to mention appointments like Gregg Phillipps to FEMA’s Office of Response and Recovery, a man with zero emergency management experience who is known as an election denier and conspiracy theorist.
I’ve written a lot about the Trump administration’s attacks on FEMA but as the calls for Secretary Noem to step down grow louder, it’s important to provide an overview of her specific role in dismantling FEMA. In just a year, Secretary Noem has succeeded in her reckless goal to greatly diminish the agency.
Implementing arbitrary, unilateral decision making
Unless forced to step down, Noem will continue to lead the Trump administration’s FEMA review council. Secretary Noem was meant to provide a draft of the council’s report at a December 11 meeting which was cancelled at the last minute without any information released by FEMA or the White House. Prior to the meeting, extensive reporting indicated that she had gutted the Council’s detailed recommendations and replaced them with her version in an altered council report. According to the New York Times, her misguided recommendations called for cutting FEMA staff to half its staffing level; reducing the number of disaster declarations; moving FEMA headquarters to Texas; renaming the agency; and keeping FEMA under her direction at DHS.
Purging of agency expertise
To date, Secretary Noem has already overseen a drastic purge of FEMA staff, with as much as 20 percent of staff reportedly cut at what was already an understaffed agency. While the numbers matter, it’s also the gravely concerning exodus of subject matter experts with deep experience in resilience, risk management and response and recovery, including the top official at FEMA’s National Response Coordination Center, four regional administrators as well as high-level staff in operations and administration, such as FEMA’s top lawyers.
Gutting lifesaving staff
Additionally, Secretary Noem has called for cutting an additional 1,000 FEMA workers, many of them from the Cadre of On-Call Response/Recovery Employees or CORE, who are the first to arrive at disaster sites to help survivors And, worse, planning documents suggest the potential cuts could be up to 11,500 people of a total of roughly 23,000 workforce, according to the New York Times.
Radical and reckless leadership:
Secretary Noem, echoing President Trump, has called for the agency’s abolition. In an apparent attempt to sabotage the agency, a series of unqualified acting chiefs have come and gone, only to be replaced by others not up to the task.
Creating a hostile and repressive work environment
Secretary Noem has been part of an overall effort by the Trump administration to create a hostile work environment across federal agencies. In April of last year, CNN reported that 50 employees including acting FEMA administrator Cameron Hamilton were given a lie detector test with one employee being escorted out of the building. A total of 21 employees were placed on leave after they criticized the administration and Secretary Noem in the Katrina Declaration.
Withholding disaster assistance:
Secretary Noem delayed billions of dollars in badly needed disaster aid to states and deliberately politicized disaster aid. Recent reporting by the New York Times estimated $17 billion in disaster assistance has been withheld from states and communities who have been relying on the funds to recover from recent storms. That delay is due to Noem’s order requiring her approval of any contract over $100,000. FEMA former administrators have criticized that approach, including Peter Gaynor who said: “to be hamstrung by $100,000 [limit] makes no sense to me. Disasters are expensive, and you’re going have to spend money to help the survivors who need it.”
Dereliction of duty:
Secretary Noem was in charge during the tragic Texas flooding over the July 4th holiday when 130 people lost their lives, including dozens of children. While many things went wrong, of particular note is Noem’s unforgivable delay of search and rescue for 72 hours after the flooding began.
In 2025, the US sustained 23 extreme weather and climate change-related events, resulting in 276 deaths and a total cost of $115 billion. The costs of these disasters were high, however unlike previous years, no hurricanes made landfall in the US. While we can’t know what will come this Atlantic hurricane season, the odds are that we could have a hurricane making landfall.
Unfortunately, the federal government and Congress won’t be able to make the needed improvements in the time needed. It’s hard not to write in hyperbolic terms, so I’ll speak to a recent report by the federal government watchdog, the Government Accountability Office (GAO). GAO added “Improving the Delivery of Federal Disaster Assistance” to GAO’s “High-Risk List” given recent disasters like Hurricane Helene and Milton, the Los Angeles Wildfires in January of 2025, and the Texas flash flooding in July of 2025.
Congress must heed the growing chorus of calls for Secretary Noem’s dismissal while also working to ensure stable funding and staffing at FEMA so it can carry out its critical mission.
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