Last year, when devastating hurricanes hit the southeast coast of the U.S., higher-ups in FEMA ordered workers to discriminate against houses that displayed Trump campaign materials on their properties.
Marn'i Washington, a FEMA official who was fired after ordering her subordinates to skip pro-Trump houses, gave an interview after her dismissal and claimed such discrimination was not an "isolated incident."
"FEMA always preaches avoidance first and then de-escalation, so this is not isolated," Washington said. "This is a colossal event of avoidance not just in the state of Florida, but you will find avoidance in the Carolinas." FEMA did pause aid in North Carolina, citing concerns over an "armed militia” threatening workers in the area.
Deanne Criswell, then director of FEMA, was hauled before Congress to answer questions about the discrimination and Florida AG Ashley Moody took legal action against the agency. "I am taking swift legal action to find out how far this political discrimination reaches and to make sure all Americans who fall victim to devastating storms are served, regardless of their political affiliation," Moody wrote in a statement.
Now the scandal gets even worse, as it turns out FEMA workers were collecting data on the politics of disaster victims.
Exclusive: FEMA Workers Improperly Collected Data About Politics of Disaster Victims
— Matt Taibbi (@mtaibbi) October 20, 2025
Politicized distribution of hurricane aid money before the 2024 election was no "isolated incident," a Homeland Security follow-up report sadly concludeshttps://t.co/KfqEu59FEY pic.twitter.com/HieH9km2za
A year later, the Privacy Office of the Department of Homeland Security is releasing a review of that episode, the broader issue of using disaster relief work to collect political intelligence on voters, and the potentially withholding of benefits from some with the wrong beliefs. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the new administration found more than just one “isolated incident,” describing violations of the Privacy Act of 1974, which with a few exceptions bars collection of information about First Amendment-protected speech, like political signage. Most tellingly, though, DHS investigators found — in a near-exact parallel to trends in pro-censorship programs — that a lot of the political controversy surrounding FEMA aid grew out of the vague way in which the agency’s Disaster Survivor Assistance Field Operations Guide was written.
The Field Operations Guide instructed FEMA workers to “Remove yourself from the situation if you feel threatened” when dealing with “hostile” individuals, the only problem being, as the new report notes: “The Disaster Survivor Assistance Field Operations Guide does not define the term ‘hostile.’”
“The way the guide was written, FEMA employees had leeway to skip outreach to a house if its signs made them feel uncomfortable,” one Washington-based First Amendment lawyer put it last week. “So it’s basically the same concept of a harm or distress standard we’re seeing in Europe with speech issues, where the emotional response of the observer is what matters legally, as opposed to a concrete rule.”
The discrimination against Trump voters dates back to at least 2021, when the DHS report highlights incidents of FEMA skipping pro-Trump homes after Hurricane Ida, as Taibbi noted:
Some examples cited: October, 2021: “Homeowner had sign stated… this is Trump country.” September, 2021: “A lot of political flags, posters, etc. ‘Fuck Joe Biden,’ ‘MAGA 2024,’ ‘Joe Biden Sucks’ ‘Trump 2024’ We do not recommend anyone visiting this location.” November 2024: ‘There was a political flyer so I didn’t leave a FEMA brochure.” Neither Criswell nor Washington responded to requests for comment.
A DC-based lawyer said this policy is alarming, adding, "People hate the government enough as it is. If it’s known that disaster relief can be politicized and nobody fixes the problem, imagine how mad people will be one or two cycles from now."
But this news should not come as a shock to anyone paying attention. Former Vice President and failed candidate Kamala Harris made it explicitly clear she believed disaster aid should be handed out on a DEI-based system.
Kamala Harris thinks that aid for floods, hurricanes, tornados, & fires should be distributed based on race:
— End Wokeness (@EndWokeness) September 27, 2024
"Communities of color need more" pic.twitter.com/Lldd8tbcds
In that C-SPAN town hall, Harris said, "It is our lowest income communities and our communities of color that are most impacted by these extreme conditions and are impacted by issues that are not of their own making. And so we have to address this in a way that is about giving resources based on equity. Understanding that we fight for equality, but we also need to fight for equity, understanding not everyone starts out at the same place. And if we want people to be in an equal place, sometimes we have to take into account those disparities."
While there's no direct link between FEMA policy and the Biden administration, it should raise more than a few eyebrows that a government agency that was caught discriminating against certain political viewpoints was gathering political data on disaster victims. Especially after Biden's VP made it clear "equity" in disaster aid was her priority.
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