\u201cThe Harris-Biden administration says they don\u2019t have any money [for hurricane relief]. \u2026 They spent it all on illegal migrants. \u2026 They stole the FEMA money just like they stole it from a bank, so they could give it to their illegal immigrants that they want to have vote for them.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2014 Former president Donald Trump, remarks at a campaign rally in Saginaw, Mich., Oct. 3<\/p>\n
Trump has been trying to weaponize the Hurricane Helene relief efforts, accusing the Biden administration of failing to provide adequate assistance. As part of his critique, he claims that there is no money available for hurricane relief because it was spent already to handle the surge of migrants at the southern border.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey stole the FEMA money just like they stole it from a bank,\u201d Trump charged, referring to the Federal Emergency Management Agency, adding in the additional falsehood that Vice President Kamala Harris wants illegal immigrants to vote for her. As we have explained many times before, this would be against the law and there is no evidence to support this claim.<\/p>\n
Trump\u2019s claims have been echoed by his supporters, such as billionaire Elon Musk. But Trump is completely wrong.<\/p>\n
Even though Trump was once president, he still appears to have little clue about the appropriations process. What\u2019s even richer is that when he was president, he did exactly what he claims Biden did \u2014 take money from FEMA\u2019s disaster fund to fund migrant programs at the southern border.<\/p>\n
FEMA is part of the Department of Homeland Security. On Wednesday, DHS Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas told reporters: \u201cWe are meeting the immediate needs with the money that we have. We are expecting another hurricane hitting. FEMA does not have the funds to make it through the season.\u201d<\/p>\n
He emphasized there was plenty of money to deal with the current disaster. \u201cWe are meeting the moment,\u201d he said, adding: \u201cWe have the immediate needs right now. On a continuing resolution, we have funds, but that is not a stable source of supply, if you will.\u201d<\/p>\n
Congress, as part of a short-term spending bill, recently provided $20 billion to the FEMA disaster relief fund. But Mayorkas noted: \u201cThat doesn\u2019t speak about the future and the fact, as I mentioned earlier, that these extreme weather events are increasing in frequency and severity, and we have to be funded for the sake of the American people. This is not a political issue.\u201d<\/p>\n
In other words, Trump falsely claimed that there is no money left for Hurricane Helene survivors. That\u2019s the opposite of what Mayorkas said.<\/p>\n
\u201cFEMA has what it needs for immediate response and recovery efforts,\u201d FEMA spokeswoman Jaclyn Rothenberg said on X. \u201cAs FEMA Administrator Deanne Criswell has said, she has the full authority to spend against the President\u2019s budget, but we\u2019re not out of hurricane season yet so we need to keep a close eye on it. We may need to go back into immediate needs funding and we will be watching it closely.\u201d<\/p>\n
So how does Trump link this to migrants? A Trump campaign spokesman pointed to FEMA\u2019s Shelter and Services Program, which gives grants to local governments and nonprofits to take care of undocumented immigrants. Congress boosted the budget from $360 million in fiscal year 2023 to $650 million in fiscal year 2024. The program\u2019s 2023 annual report says it provides shelter, such as hotel\/motel services, food and transportation, including plane tickets up to $700 a person.<\/p>\n
As we said, Congress appropriated this money, just as it did the disaster fund. There\u2019s no evidence that any money from the disaster fund was used to help migrants.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese claims are completely false,\u201d DHS said in a statement Thursday night. \u201cAs Secretary Mayorkas said, FEMA has the necessary resources to meet the immediate needs associated with Hurricane Helene and other disasters. The Shelter and Services Program (SSP) is a completely separate, appropriated grant program that was authorized and funded by Congress and is not associated in any way with FEMA\u2019s disaster-related authorities or funding streams.\u201d<\/p>\n
Trump has a habit of assuming other politicians act in the same way as he would. So we wondered why he would accuse Biden of raiding the FEMA disaster fund to handle undocumented migrants.<\/p>\n
It turns out that\u2019s because he did this! In 2019, the Trump administration, in the middle of hurricane season, told Congress that it was taking $271 million from DHS programs, including $155 million from the disaster fund, to pay for immigration detention space and temporary hearing locations for asylum seekers who have been forced to wait in Mexico. \u201cThe U.S. is facing a security and humanitarian crisis on the Southern border,\u201d the administration said in its notice that it was redirecting the funds.<\/p>\n
The monthly reports issued by the FEMA disaster fund show $38 million was plucked and given to Immigration and Customs Enforcement in August that year \u2014 just before the prime storm period of September and October.<\/p>\n
The Trump campaign did not respond to questions about Trump\u2019s actions in 2019.<\/p>\n
Trump falsely claims FEMA has run out of disaster money \u2014 and then falsely says that\u2019s because money instead was spent on migrants. There is no evidence the Biden administration spent FEMA disaster money on migrants. Rather, that\u2019s what Trump did.<\/p>\n
He earns Four Pinocchios.<\/p>\n
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\u201cThe Harris-Biden administration says they don\u2019t have any money [for hurricane relief]. \u2026 They spent it all on illegal migrants. \u2026 They stole the FEMA money just like they stole it from a bank, so they could give it to their illegal immigrants that they want to have vote for them.\u201d \u2014 Former president Donald […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":10614,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10613","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10613","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10613"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10613\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/10614"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10613"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10613"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstriumphs.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10613"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}