Trump, lawmakers at odds over whether FEMA should be elevated to Cabinet-level agency or completely overhauled

While President Donald Trump wants to gut the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), lawmakers on both sides of the aisle are seeking to elevate FEMA to a Cabinet-level agency. 

FEMA is currently housed under the Department of Homeland Security, but the House effort would solidify FEMA as its own separate agency, according to a discussion draft of the legislation released Thursday. 

House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee Chairman Rep. Sam Graves, R-Mo., and committee ranking member Rep. Rick Larsen, D-Wash., are spearheading the legislation. 

Other proposals included in the draft legislation are instructing the Office of Management and Budget to create a centralized website tracking disaster assistance recovery across the federal government, and allowing FEMA to foot the bill for repairs to homes suffering damage in disasters. 

Currently, FEMA only covers expenses that make a home livable following disasters. 

‘FEMA IS NOT GOOD’: TRUMP ANNOUNCES AGENCY OVERHAUL DURING VISIT TO NORTH CAROLINA 

Workers, community members and business owners clean up debris in the aftermath of Hurricane Helene in Marshall, North Carolina, on Monday, Sept. 30, 2024. (Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post via Getty Images)

“By releasing this discussion draft legislation, we hope to engage our colleagues and stakeholders on comprehensive FEMA reform,” Graves said in a Thursday statement. “This draft bill includes substantive changes that will transform FEMA and our emergency programs to be much more state and locally driven – not micro-managed into ineffectiveness by the federal government.”

While Trump and Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem have voiced support for eradicating FEMA, the former acting administrator of FEMA, Cameron Hamilton, warned against gutting the agency on Wednesday.

“I do not believe it is in the best interest of the American people to eliminate the Federal Emergency Management Agency,” Hamilton told lawmakers on the House Appropriations committee on Wednesday. 

“Having said that, I’m not in a position to make a decision,” Hamilton said. “That is a conversation that should be had between the president of the United States and this governing body.”

However, Hamilton, who previously served as a hospital corpsman in the U.S. Navy with SEAL Team 8 and started leading FEMA in January, was ousted from his post Thursday. 

ACTING FEMA ADMINISTRATOR OUT AFTER PUSHING BACK AGAINST TRUMP’S AGENCY PLANS

Former acting FEMA Administrator Cam Hamilton, who previously served as a hospital corpsman in the U.S. Navy with SEAL Team 8 and started leading FEMA in January, was ousted from his post Thursday. (Pete Marovich/Getty Images)

FEMA confirmed to Fox News Digital Thursday that Hamilton was no longer with the agency. 

Days after his inauguration in January, Trump visited North Carolina to oversee the state’s efforts to recover from Hurricane Helene, more than 120 days after the storm struck the state. On the trip, Trump floated plans to gut FEMA, which oversaw the disaster relief efforts. 

“I’ll also be signing an executive order to begin the process of fundamentally reforming and overhauling FEMA, or maybe getting rid of FEMA,” Trump told reporters in North Carolina. “I think, frankly, FEMA is not good.”

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The executive order established a review council to evaluate potential reforms to FEMA, including whether the agency’s bureaucracy restricts its ability to appropriately respond to disasters. Likewise, Trump’s budget proposal includes plans to slash nearly $650 million in FEMA grants. 

On Tuesday, Noem told lawmakers that Trump stands by his statements that FEMA’s current setup should be quashed. 

“He believes that FEMA and its response in many, many circumstances has failed the American people, and that FEMA as it exists today should be eliminated,” Noem said.