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A Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) staff member was terminated after advising their disaster response team to bypass homes with signs supporting former President Donald Trump while assessing Florida’s hurricane-hit areas in the wake of Hurricane Milton, the agency said on Saturday.
FEMA Administrator Deanne Criswell denounced the staff member’s conduct as “reprehensible” and confirmed their employment termination.
“More than 22,000 FEMA employees every day adhere to FEMA’s core values and are dedicated to helping people before, during and after disasters, often sacrificing time with their own families to help disaster survivors,” Criswell said in a post on X before detailing the incident.
“This is a clear violation of FEMA’s core values & principles to help people regardless of their political affiliation,” she continued.
“This was reprehensible. I want to be clear to all of my employees and the American people, this type of behavior and action will not be tolerated at FEMA and we will hold people accountable if they violate these standards of conduct,” she added.
The incident was first reported by The Daily Wire, which cited internal communications showing that FEMA official Marn’i Washington had issued her directive both verbally and via a Microsoft Teams chat used by relief workers canvassing Lake Placid homes impacted by Hurricane Milton last month.
“Avoid homes advertising Trump,” Washington wrote in a “best practices” memo to employees.
“Trump sign no entry per leadership,” were the notes left in FEMA’s monitoring system.
FEMA staff informed the publication that approximately 20 residences showing Trump flags or signs frequently seen during electoral periods were skipped from late October through November following the directive, New York Post reported.
The House Oversight Committee’s Chairman James Comer has requested FEMA Administrator Criswell to appear at a hearing on November 19, and address the recent incident, including their handling of Hurricanes Helene and Milton, as stated in his letter to Criswell.
The Kentucky Republican said: “In the wake of the recent major disasters that impacted Americans of all political persuasions, it is critical that FEMA adheres to its disaster relief mission.”
According to CNN, a FEMA spokesperson said: “The employee who issued this guidance had no authority and was given no direction to tell teams to avoid these homes.” The agency “helps all survivors regardless of their political preference or affiliation,” the spokesperson added.
FEMA is currently examining the number of residences bypassed during the October 27 incident. Earlier on Friday, the organisation deployed fresh teams to contact previously missed households in the affected areas.
Whilst declining to provide additional details due to the ongoing investigation, the spokesperson indicated that FEMA officials were, “horrified that this took place and therefore have taken extreme actions to correct this situation and have ensured that the matter was addressed at all levels.”
Following the reports, Florida governor Ron DeSantis announced a state-level investigation into the matter.
DeSantis took to X stating that: “The blatant weaponisation of government by partisan activists in the federal bureaucracy is yet another reason why the Biden-Harris administration is in its final days. At my direction, the Division of Emergency Management is launching an investigation into the federal government’s targeted discrimination of Floridians who support Donald Trump.”
Hurricane Milton, which caused the deaths of over 20 people, destroyed homes, and left millions in Florida without power, struck just two weeks after Hurricane Helene made landfall as a Category 4 storm.