The agency is now being audited over controversy in the aftermath of Hurricanes Helene and Milton.
The Department of Homeland Security’s inspector general this week confirmed it is auditing the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) over concerns that its employees avoided homes that displayed signs supporting then-presidential candidate Donald Trump in the aftermath of several hurricanes.
In a
letter dated Jan. 6, the office told Reps. Sam Graves (R-Mo.) and Scott Perry (R-Pa.) that an audit of the disaster relief agency was initiated on Dec. 17, 2024, to “determine how well FEMA followed its policies and procedures when addressing safety concerns and determining community trends that impact disaster survivor assistance in response to Hurricanes Helene and Milton.”
Two months ago, a now-terminated FEMA employee, Marn’i Washington, allegedly told a FEMA team in Florida to bypass homes that display Trump signs. After reports surfaced that FEMA workers were told to avoid those homes, FEMA Director Deanne Criswell announced that the employee, Washington, was fired.
“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,” Criswell said in a statement at the time.
But Washington later said in several
media interviews that the policy was systemic and that she was being scapegoated. FEMA officials “were already avoiding these homes, based on community trends, from hostile political encounters,” she told Fox News at the time, adding that the policy had “nothing to do with the campaign sign, it just so happened to be a part of the community trend.”
“Firstly, I’m being framed,” she
told NewsNation in mid-November 2024. “There’s no violation of the Hatch Act. I was simply following orders.”
On Dec. 3, 2024, Graves and Perry, two lawmakers who sit on the House Transportation Committee, called for an investigation into the claims made by Washington and other reports “of the deliberate avoidance of homes with Trump campaign or political signs” during FEMA’s response to the two hurricanes.
“The actions taken by FEMA supervisors in directing employees to avoid homes that displayed Trump campaign signs or flags are disturbing and raise serious questions about the culture and political bias that permeates FEMA leadership,” they
wrote, adding that the committee is also concerned about whether the practice was “more widespread than reported” and could have harmed hurricane victims.
In November 2024, Criswell testified before a House subcommittee and
said that not providing aid to people due to political beliefs is “completely at odds with FEMA’s mission,” stressing that the incident wasn’t part of a broader FEMA trend.
FEMA had faced criticism late last year after Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas and Criswell suggested the relief agency would run out of funding needed to last the remainder of the 2024 hurricane season.
The announcement from Mayorkas
did not sit well with certain Republicans. Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-Fla.), Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, and others highlighted two FEMA announcements last year allocating more than $1 billion to offset the costs of illegal immigrants who were flooding U.S. cities, which GOP officials said should instead have been provided to communities reeling from the hurricanes.
Helene hit the southeastern United States in late September 2024, causing widespread destruction, particularly in the Appalachian region of western North Carolina. Weeks later, Milton slammed into Florida’s west coast, causing devastation across the Tampa area.
