Even in Blue, Blue California, there are areas that remain predominantly Red, including areas that have suffered death, destruction, and ruin caused by wildfires.
But a review of Trump’s record by POLITICO’s E&E News and interviews with two former Trump White House officials show that the former president was flagrantly partisan at times in response to disasters and on at least three occasions hesitated to give disaster aid to areas he considered politically hostile or ordered special treatment for pro-Trump states.
Mark Harvey, who was Trump’s senior director for resilience policy on the National Security Council staff, told E&E News on Wednesday that Trump initially refused to approve disaster aid for California after deadly wildfires in 2018 because of the state’s Democratic leanings.
But Harvey said Trump changed his mind after Harvey pulled voting results to show him that heavily damaged Orange County, California, had more Trump supporters than the entire state of Iowa.
Mark Harvey, who was Trump’s senior director for resilience policy on the National Security Council staff told Politico:
“We went as far as looking up how many votes he got in those impacted areas … to show him these are people who voted for you,” said Harvey, who recently endorsed Vice President Kamala Harris alongside more than 100 other Republican former national security officials.
Although TFG slammed the Biden/Harris administration for their response to Hurricane Helene and even politicized and lied about it, Trump failed miserably during his presidency at handling natural disasters.
Here is a partial list of Trump’s questionable actions on disaster aid, in addition to his politicization of California wildfires:
- Trump diverted over $150 million in FEMA disaster funds ahead of Hurricane Dorian hitting the Southeast to the border, exactly what he is falsely accusing Biden of doing
- Trump rolled back flooding standards intended to prevent the very kind of devastation currently being seen in Western North Carolina and other parts of the South in order to benefit his wealthy donors
- He threatened to veto legislation providing nearly $5 billion in disaster relief funding after extreme earthquakes
- He dangled federal aid for Michigan over his opposition to the state’s mail-in ballot program
- He called for cuts to numerous programs that help prepare, manage, and mitigate wildfires
- He proposed budget cuts to NOAA that would have left the US unprepared for extreme weather
President Biden and CA Governor Newsom commented on this latest finding:
A Blast From TFG’s Past On Handling Natural Disasters:
