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President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris visited parts of the South that were hit by Hurricane Helene Wednesday. Traveling on Air Force One with Biden, Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas told reporters the Federal Emergency Management Agency is running short of funds. FEMA is able to meet immediate disaster relief needs following Helene, he said, but will need more funding to make it to the end of hurricane season, which lasts through the end of November. September and October are typically the heaviest hurricane months.
The Associated Press reports that Mayorkas didn’t specify how much more FEMA needs, but it’ll have to be more than the $16 billion in additional funding in the short-term funding bill Congress recently passed to avoid a government shutdown. Members of the House and Senate will be out campaigning for reelection until after the November 5 election, but it’s possible Congress may have to hold an emergency session this month to allocate more funding for FEMA, according to a joint letter issued Tuesday by senators from the affected states.
Pissy little weasel Mike Johnson (R-Louisiana), the speaker of the House, told the New York Times that wouldn’t be necessary, because heavens, passing bills is sooooo haaaaaard, you guys.
“We wouldn’t even conceivably have the request ready before we get back in November,” Mr. Johnson said in an interview, noting that it would take time to assess the damage and calculate the costs of recovery and rebuilding. “There’s no necessity for Congress to come back.”
While the stopgap bill Mr. Biden signed into law last week contained an additional $16 billion for FEMA, preliminary assessments of the damage from Moody’s and others predict a cleanup effort that could cost tens of billions.
So far, more than 150,000 households in the six states affected by the storm have registered with FEMA to receive assistance, and that number is likely to grow rapidly as people get their immediate needs sorted out, said FEMA spokesperson Frank Matranga.
Also too, since nothing in America happens that isn’t immigrants’ fault, a bunch of rightwing outlets are griping that US AMERICA CITIZENS are now going to suffer because FEMA gave all its money to migrants!!!!! Well, not all its money, but the amount should presumably be zero because asylum-seekers should all be shot or something. Even Republican Senate nominees have been getting in on the fearmongering.
Y’see, FEMA does indeed provide some $640 million in annual grant funding to nonprofit groups that assist people who have been processed by Customs and Border Protection and released on humanitarian parole while they seek asylum. Or as the wingers put it HUNDREDS OF MILLIONS OF DOLLARS!!!!!! The Daily Mail, just to make the number scarier, counted two years’ worth of the program’s budget so it could say the government is “running out of money to deal with Hurricane Helene after blowing billions on migrants.”
This is where we direct you once more to that New York Times quote, which estimates the outlay just for Helene will be in the “tens of billions,” so no, the annual budget for the grant program wouldn’t go very far at all, but math is communist, no YOU shut up.
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