Hurricanes, Floods, Wildfires, and Tornado Season Without FEMA

U.S. rocked by four 1-in-1,000-year storms in less than a week

Climate change is making severe storms both more common and more intense.

First the river rose in Texas. Then, the rains fell hard over North Carolina, New Mexico and Illinois.

In less than a week, there were at least four 1-in-1,000-year rainfall events across the United States — intense deluges that are thought to have roughly a 0.1% chance of happening in any given year.

https://share.google/gPkCQHubGDnT0k53h

 

It's sad really. Sometimes people would rather cut off their own foot to save their face. Politics can kill people, when they vote against things meant to help them, just because they hate the party offering them help.

One woman at the meeting said...

"If you vote to keep Biden's money, I will hold you personally responsible and personally liable for any and all harm that comes to me and my family, as well as the residents of this county."

 

It's not just Kerrville though. So many people in red states have put themselves in line for more harm than good by believing in Trump.

FEMA Is Eliminating Hazard Mitigation Programs, Leaving Americans Nationwide at Risk as Disasters Worsen

Without these programs, the vast majority of federal funding for disasters will be spent on response and recovery after disasters occur and in the places they occur, rather than attempting to reduce costs through predisaster mitigation—even as events such as floods and wildfires become more frequent and more damaging as a result of climate change.

Predisaster mitigation not only saves lives, but it’s also a good investment: studies by the National Institute of Building Sciences (PDF) and the US Chambers of Commerce find that hazard mitigation programs can generate benefits of between $6–$13 for every dollar invested.

The scale of the cuts in ruby-red Louisiana -- 34 grants totalling $185 million -- prompted the state's Republican senior senator, Bill Cassidy, to publicly condemn the decision to cancel the program.

"We passed BRIC into law and provided funds for it," said Cassidy in a speech on the Senate floor in April. "To do anything other than use that money to fund flood mitigation projects is to thwart the will of Congress."

There's an interactive map on here to click on each state. It makes no sense to deny funding to better prepare an area prone to flash flooding, earthquakes, hurricanes, and such before history repeats itself, and tragedy and loss happens again.

I'm just including a screen shots, but below, but you can find your state on the map in the article link.

In Florida, 18 of the 22 counties that stood to benefit from nearly $233 million in grants cancelled voted for Trump, and over 60% of Louisiana voters who voted for Trump screwed themselves out of 175 million.






https://www.urban.org/urban-wire/fe...s-leaving-americans-nationwide-risk-disasters

 

I just quoted one example in the article below, but this type anger goes all across the heartland of Trump country.

FEMA's storm prep program hammer communities that voted for Trump

A CBS News investigation found two-thirds of counties that have lost funding from this FEMA program supported President Trump in the 2024 election.

The mayor of Central -- a community of about 30,000 outside of Baton Rouge -- Evans and his family were forced to evacuate their home by boat in 2016 when flooding from torrential rains destroyed 60% of the structures in town.

"Flood water doesn't discriminate," said Evans, a Republican and supporter of President Trump. '"Any person that flooded is shocked that it would be considered politics to do flood mitigation."
So when he received word in April that FEMA was canceling a grant program that would provide nearly $40 million for a new flood control system in Central, he was angry.

https://www.cbsnews.com/femagrantcuts/

 

There are so many stories like this. It's just plain ignorance for our government to prefer handing out aid after the next disaster and repeat itself more often than necessary. The sad part is that many states can't afford the type of infrastructure alone needed to limit the problems from occurring over and over.

FEMA cancels $1 billion for flood prevention projects in Chesapeake Bay region

Crisfield Mayor Darlene Taylor sees it, the low-lying Maryland town has no future unless it can hold back rising water. Computer models suggest that the adjacent Chesapeake Bay could get high enough by 2050 to trigger daily floods that are deep enough to stall cars on roads.

Hope arrived in the form of a federal grant program under the Federal Emergency Management Agency, created during the first Trump administration. The Building Resilient Infrastructure and Communities (BRIC) program helped rural communities like hers to invest in massive projects to fight disaster threats, ranging from wildfires to floods.

Crisfield officially got word from FEMA last July that it had secured $36 million from the program to launch the first phase of its massive flood-protection initiative. “Everything had lined up and everything was in place for this to be a highly successful project,” Taylor said.

A lot has changed since then. Trump returned to office in January, vowing to drastically shrink the size of the federal government. In a terse April 4 press statement, FEMA announced it was pulling the plug on the disaster-preparedness funding, not just for Crisfield but for all applicants and grantees, calling it “wasteful and ineffective,” though without citing evidence to support those claims.

https://www.bayjournal.com/news/cli...cle_43c10739-9b02-4a27-a39c-2a66ffc6a19a.html

Anyway, as long as we have Senators and Congress backing Trump on crap like this we will hear these disaster stories far more often than we need to. They are bending and bowing to Trump, even when they are hurting the people who voted for them. It's even going to be worse for blue states.

Even worse is that Trump is making natural disasters, infrastructure funding, and support based more on loyalty to him instead of need.

Red states win, blue states lose in Army Corps spending plan

Red states are receiving about two-thirds of the total in construction funding

https://rollcall.com/2025/05/19/red-states-win-blue-states-lose-in-army-corps-spending-plan/

 

By FEMA eliminating Hazard Mitigation Programs, it could cost us 15 times more after the fact in areas prone to flooding and natural disasters. Make that make sense, especially when we are seeing more and more billion dollar or more disasters.

Every US$1 invested in risk reduction and prevention can save up to US$15 in post-disaster recovery. Every US$1 invested in making infrastructure disaster-resilient saves US$4 in reconstruction. The cost benefits of investing in prevention and resilience are clear, yet for every US$100 of disaster-related ODA, only 50 cents are invested in protecting development from the impact of disasters.

https://share.google/cyXQvUxbuqlwnIPQv

 

The sad part is when a reporter get lashed out by Trump for asking a question.

A reporter asked Trump on Friday, "Families are upset because they say that warnings didn't go out in time, and they say that people could have been saved. What do you say to those families?"

Part of Trump's response....

"Only a bad person would ask a question like that, to be honest with you, I don't know who you are, but only a very evil person would ask a question like that.

It's sad that in Trump's mind when a reporter asks a question coming from upset families it makes her a bad and evil person.


https://share.google/ueUJ3IqychFOdFTFp