A FEMA whistleblower is calling for the agency, which Trump has threatened to phase out, to become independent again.
By Mike Ludwig ,
February 5, 2026
U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Kristi Noem speaks during a news conference in the National Response Coordination Center at the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) headquarters on January 24, 2026, in Washington, D.C.Al Drago / Getty Images
Secretary Kristi Noem’s Department of Homeland Security (DHS) was already facing scrutiny as temperatures plunged and winter storms rolled across much of the United States at the end of January. The expansive winter storms came just after immigration officers ultimately under her command killed two people in Minnesota. The killings heightened public anger against Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Border Patrol, both under Noem’s purview, as the agencies continued their spree of occupying Democrat-run cities.
The storms then left tens of thousands without power and claimed at least 100 lives from Texas to Tennessee and across much of the Southeast. Some communities are still waiting for power more than a week later.
Now, a growing chorus of experts, agency whistleblowers, and members of Congress say Noem has left the U.S. unprepared for disasters by gutting the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and impeding the dispersal of federal aid.
“It’s very clear that Secretary Kristi Noem is undermining FEMA’s capabilities and putting the public in harm’s way,” said Abby McIlraith, a FEMA disaster aid manager and whistleblower, in press call on February 4.
President Donald Trump announced vague plans to phase out the agency early on in his second term. His administration has hampered FEMA through budget cuts, and thousands of staffers have left or been fired as part of a wider gutting of federal agencies. However, as arctic winds and icy storms threatened to pummel half the country in January, The Washington Post reported that officials were forced to pause plans for terminating dozens of FEMA workers.
Secretary Kristi Noem’s Department of Homeland Security (DHS) was already facing scrutiny as temperatures plunged and winter storms rolled across much of the United States at the end of January. The expansive winter storms came just after immigration officers ultimately under her command killed two people in Minnesota. The killings heightened public anger against Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Border Patrol, both under Noem’s purview, as the agencies continued their spree of occupying Democrat-run cities.
The storms then left tens of thousands without power and claimed at least 100 lives from Texas to Tennessee and across much of the Southeast. Some communities are still waiting for power more than a week later.
Now, a growing chorus of experts, agency whistleblowers, and members of Congress say Noem has left the U.S. unprepared for disasters by gutting the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and impeding the dispersal of federal aid.
“It’s very clear that Secretary Kristi Noem is undermining FEMA’s capabilities and putting the public in harm’s way,” said Abby McIlraith, a FEMA disaster aid manager and whistleblower, in press call on February 4.
President Donald Trump announced vague plans to phase out the agency early on in his second term. His administration has hampered FEMA through budget cuts, and thousands of staffers have left or been fired as part of a wider gutting of federal agencies. However, as arctic winds and icy storms threatened to pummel half the country in January, The Washington Post reported that officials were forced to pause plans for terminating dozens of FEMA workers.
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On January 27, The New York Times reported that Noem’s policy mandating that expenditures over $100,000 be approved by her office had held up $17 billion in federal aid for states recovering and rebuilding after recent disasters. Noem announced the release of $2.2 billion in disaster funds two days later, but members of Congress and FEMA employees say Noem’s delays have already caused harm, including in communities struck by flash floods in central Texas that claimed dozens of lives last summer.
“When catastrophic flooding struck Texans in July, Kristi Noem delayed search and rescue teams by 72 hours,” said Rep. Greg Casar, a Democrat representing areas hit by the 2025 floods. “Experts will tell you when disaster strikes, every second matters, and for those keeping track at home, Kristi Noem delayed search and rescue by 260,000 seconds.”
Calls on Congress to impeach Noem are reaching a fever pitch, with some Republicans appearing to blame Noem for the scandals at DHS in order to shield Trump from scrutiny. Sen. Thom Tillis (R-North Carolina) voted to confirm Noem but publicly demanded the secretary resign last week in the wake of the killing of Alex Pretti, the Minneapolis resident Noem baselessly called a “domestic terrorist” after he was tackled by federal agents and shot dead on January 24.
While some Republicans claim the president must be receiving bad advice, Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-Louisiana) was blunt, saying the “credibility of ICE and DHS are at stake” in a social media post after Pretti’s killing.
Noem also repeatedly characterized Renee Nicole Good as a domestic terrorist after an ICE agent killed the mother of three in Minneapolis on January 7, an obvious lie that undermined the administration’s propaganda campaign against people who protest ICE and Border Patrol.
“It should have been the last straw for Noem to lie about an American citizen who was shot in the back while she cashes in on jets for herself and gives her billionaire friends favors and contracts and support,” said Casar, adding that Noem fired thousands of public servants at FEMA who “kept us all safe.”
FEMA was established as an independent agency in 1979 and absorbed by DHS in 2003, not long after the entire department was created in during the Bush administration’s so-called “war on terror.” McIlraith, a specialist at FEMA who helps disaster survivors apply for federal aid, said Noem has “dismantled entire programs, canceled contracts, cut staff, censored research, and delayed and denied assistance dollars, ultimately failing the American public.”
“This is absolutely appalling, and it makes an already difficult disaster process even more arduous for the people FEMA serves,” McIlraith said. “I see firsthand the pain and trauma that families go through, and how delays and red tape make it even harder on the worst day of their lives.”
McIlraith has been unable to assist disaster victims since August 2025, when she joined a group of more than 180 current and former FEMA employees in signing a whistleblower declaration on the anniversary of Hurricane Katrina. The letter warned Congress that Noem’s policies, in addition to leaving the government unprepared for disasters, likely violate federal law. Noem quickly retaliated, placing many of the whistleblowers on leave in a move Democrats said was blatantly illegal.
“Secretary Noem took only 36 hours to illegally retaliate against us as whistleblowers … that is twice as long as she took to send search and rescue to Kerrville,” McIlraith said, referring to a community hard-hit by the deadly July 4 flash floods in Texas. “In fact, two of the whistleblowers who were deployed on the ground in Texas were sent home from their critical work helping people.”
McIlraith’s work had already been impeded before her suspension due to Noem’s policies. She said she was transferred from her job helping families navigate the disaster aid application process, and instead placed on FEMA’s general helpline answering calls, a job normally done by contractors. That contract stalled shortly before the floods hit central Texas over the July 4 weekend, causing the volume of calls on the FEMA helpline to spike.
“That meant that disaster survivors, some of whom had just lost everything, were waiting hours and hours all day just to talk to someone, or the phone never got answered at all,” McIlraith said. “I remember sitting at my desk watching the call queues just climb, each number on my screen representing a person or a family who’s waiting for help that I couldn’t give them.”
Ken Pagurek, the chief of search and rescue missions at FEMA, resigned in the weeks following the Texas floods, reportedly in response to the delays in delivering federal aid under Noem. Lawmakers demanded an independent investigation into Noem’s actions during the 72 hours before search and rescue teams were deployed to flooded areas, and Casar said that probe in now underway.
Casar introduced legislation to restore funding and staffing at FEMA to pre-Trump levels, but the bill is unlikely to succeed in the GOP-controlled Congress. With Trump’s deadly mass deportation campaign dividing lawmakers and the nation, McIlraith said Congress must go further and make FEMA an independent, cabinet-level agency that is separate from DHS.
The deadly winter storms are complicating negotiations in Congress over funding for FEMA, as Democrats refuse to fund DHS without passing measures to rein in ICE’s deadly enforcement tactics in Minnesota and beyond. Lawmakers have until February 13 to pass legislation funding DHS before key agencies face lapses, and Republicans have misleadingly claimed that holding up funding for DHS could inhibit FEMA’s response to the winter storms.
However, Casar said Congress has already provided billions of dollars in disaster preparation grants and recovery funding to FEMA. Noem is failing to use the money.
“There’s been billions of dollars appropriated that are not being sent to communities, so, in so many ways, Kristi Noem has already shut down FEMA assistance, period,” Casar said. “And that is part of the importance of impeaching or firing Kristi Noem.”
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