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In WNC, Trump floats dismantling FEMA to put states in charge of disaster response

President Donald Trump arriving in Asheville, N.C., on Jan. 24, 2025, joined by First Lady Melania Trump and N.C. Gov. Josh Stein (D).
President Donald Trump arriving in Asheville, N.C., on Jan. 24, 2025, joined by First Lady Melania Trump and N.C. Gov. Josh Stein (D).

President Donald Trump wants to overhaul the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) – and during a visit to Western North Carolina on Friday he floated the idea of eliminating the agency altogether.

Trump landed at Asheville Regional Airport Friday morning on his first visit to North Carolina since the start of his second term. The western part of the state, along with neighboring communities in Tennessee, has been reeling since Hurricane Helene unleashed devastating flooding and landslides in the mountain region last September.

“ FEMA has been a very big disappointment,” Trump said. “They cost a tremendous amount of money. It's very bureaucratic and it's very slow. Other than that, we're very happy with them.”

Getting rid of FEMA would take congressional action and it is unclear if there is any support from lawmakers to do so. The agency is usually only called into a disaster area by a governor when the state cannot handle recovery alone.

Trump said he wants to restructure disaster response so that states handle resources that the federal government provides.

“ I think we're going to recommend that FEMA go away and we pay directly. We pay a percentage to the state, but the state should fix this. If the state did this from the beginning, it would have been a lot better situation,” Trump said.

Trump also announced that he has enlisted the Army Corps of Engineers to repair roads and bridges and is preparing to sign an executive order “slashing red tape and all bureaucratic  barriers and permits to ensure the rapid reconstruction of the roads here in Western North Carolina.”

“We're going to go through a permitting process that's called no permitting. Just get it done,” he said.

In North Carolina, Helene caused an estimated nearly $60 billion in damage. A bipartisan federal funding bill signed into law last month by then-President Joe Biden allocated billions of dollars to disaster relief. But the aid will take months to arrive, and local officials say more help is needed.

The North Carolina General Assembly has, in three different rounds of legislation, allocated over $1 billion in state funding toward a range of recovery needs – from infrastructure rebuilding to rental assistance and from social services to support for daycares destroyed in the region.

READ MORE: FEMA extends temporary housing program until May after urging from politicians

As of Jan. 20, FEMA has provided more than $316 million in cash grants to Western North Carolina survivors, including more than $6.2 million in rental assistance, according to the agency. The U.S. Small Business Administration has also approved more than $213 million in low-interest loans to help survivors.

During their visit to Western North Carolina, the president and First Lady Melania Trump attended a briefing on Hurricane Helene recovery, which was held in Fletcher. In the afternoon, they traveled to Swannanoa, one of the communities hardest hit by Helene, where they met with storm survivors.

No Buncombe County or Asheville elected officials attended the recovery briefing, according to a schedule released by the White House. North Carolina Gov. Josh Stein (D) was also not on the list of attendees, although he spoke with Trump on the tarmac at Asheville Regional Airport and stood next to the president during a brief exchange with reporters.

As he has done in recent days, Trump sharply criticized FEMA. He said he is considering taking steps that will lead to states, rather than the federal government, spearheading disaster relief efforts in the future, although he did not provide details.

"We're looking at the whole concept of FEMA," Trump told reporters. "I like, frankly, the concept when North Carolina gets hit, the governor takes care of it. When Florida gets hit, the governor takes care of it. Meaning, the state takes care of it… They have a group of people come in from an area that don't even know where they're going in order to solve immediately a problem is something that never worked for me. But this is probably one of the best examples of it not working."

Trump told reporters that disaster aid in the future "will go through us," although it was not clear to what part of the government he was referring.

"So rather than going through FEMA, it will go through us," Trump said. "And I think maybe this is a good place to start. Because, and in all fairness to the governor, in all fairness to everybody else, FEMA was not on the ball, and we’re going to turn it all around.”

Among those on the White House's list of attendees for the briefing in Fletcher were U.S. Reps. Chuck Edwards, Virginia Foxx, Tim Moore and Pat Harrigan; North Carolina Commissioner of Agriculture Steve Troxler; N.C. House Speaker Rep. Destin Hall; N.C. Majority Leader Rep. Brenden Jones; and N.C. Rep. Dudley Greene, all Republicans.

Trump said that he will be working with the newly-elected Josh Stein.

“I want to say that we're very disappointed in FEMA. Your new governor, it's not his fault, he's brand new to the whole situation. But we're going to work together with the governor,” Trump said.

In a statement Friday afternoon, Stein said it was a "positive signal" that Trump made Western North Carolina his first visit outside Washington since being inaugurated earlier this week.

"I thanked the President for coming and asked for his support of $20 billion in additional disaster relief and for 100% reimbursement of eligible FEMA expenses for another six months," Stein said. “Families, businesses, and communities are struggling and need these urgent resources to help them rebuild. I look forward to working with the Trump Administration in the coming weeks and months to get people what they need to rebuild and recover.”

Trump said Republican National Committee Chair Michael Whatley will be pivotal in North Carolina’s recovery moving forward but did not expand on his involvement. Whatley, a North Carolina native and former head of the state Republican Party, was re-elected to lead the RNC just last week.

“If Michael Whatley does half as good a job for North Carolina, as he did for my campaign, we’ll be very happy,” Trump said during his visit.

In Swannanoa, Trump met with Ramona Nix, the pastor of Eagle Rock Church, as well as with local residents who were beneficiaries of relief efforts spearheaded by Samaritan’s Purse.

Franklin Graham, president of Samaritan’s Purse, introduced Trump to families affected by the storm outside of a home belonging to Swannanoa residents Chris and Kim West.

“ We've come to North Carolina with a simple message for all the people of this region who were hit so hard by Hurricane Helene. And that message is very simple: You are not forgotten any longer,” Trump said, again taking a dig at the Biden administration.

The families that spoke described their battles with insurance companies and FEMA, which Trump lambasted, saying that he would “end it right now.”

READ NEXT: Living in limbo: Thousands of WNC Helene survivors face years of transient living

Helene caused catastrophic damage when it swept through Western North Carolina in September. The storm brought historic flooding, wind and landslides, killing 104 people and damaging or destroying an estimated 73,000 homes.

Nearly four months after the storm, thousands of residents remain without a permanent place to live.

Felicia Sonmez is a reporter covering growth and development for Blue Ridge Public Radio.
Gerard Albert is the Western North Carolina rural communities reporter for BPR News.
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