Trump Plans Executive Order to Reform or Abolish FEMA, Citing Agency as 'a Disaster'

Jan 24, 2025, 04:52 PM

During a visit to hurricane-damaged Fletcher, North Carolina, on January 24, 2025, President Donald Trump announced plans to sign an executive order to begin the process of fundamentally reforming or possibly eliminating the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). Trump criticized the agency, stating that "FEMA has turned out to be a disaster" and that "frankly, FEMA is not good." He suggested that states should "use your state to fix it" rather than "wasting time calling FEMA," and proposed that the federal government might instead "pay a percentage to the state." Trump's remarks point to a shift toward state-led disaster management, potentially reshaping how emergency responses are handled in the United States.