Four days after starting his second administration, President Donald Trump floated the idea of “ getting rid of ” the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which manages federal disaster response. But at a Thursday meeting, the 12-person review council he appointed to propose changes to FEMA seemed more focused on reforms than total dismantlement.
FEMA must be “reformed into an agency that is supporting our local and state officials that are there on the ground and responsive to the individuals that are necessary to help people be healed and whole through these situations,” Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem said, who co-chairs the council. But, she added, FEMA “as it exists today needs to be eliminated.”
