OPINION –
In an Oversight hearing this week, US Representative Garret Graves grilled FEMA Administrator Deanne Criswell on the failed government response to Hurricane Helene in North Carolina.
The unprecedented inland mountain area disaster decimated greater Asheville and several small towns on September 27, nearly two months ago.
Since then, the media and government have been largely silent, majorly underreporting deaths at a couple hundred while volunteers with boots on the ground have consistently described thousands of bodies left to rot in trees and debris. This number only continues to climb as impacted residents are forsaken in grossly negligent FEMA rescue and relief operations.
At one point during Kamala Harris’ presidential run, she made a visit to the Asheville area to “deliver aid,” but a National Guard whistleblower reduced the event to a façade for a photo shoot. A plane was allegedly loaded with materials only to never be deployed.
Other accounts out of North Carolina report hurricane supplies being re-routed to support the FEMA-funded migrant invasion under “Border Czar” Harris and US Secretary of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas.
“Administrator, you understand the ridiculousness of this situation,” Graves implored during the November 19th hearing. “This really is an unacceptable situation.”
He went on to explain that migrants, “who broke the law to be here illegally,” can be eligible to claim roughly $10,000 taxpayer dollars (per individual) in housing, food, clothing, transportation, and healthcare. They can sleep comfortably in hotels for about $200 per night in the Texas area, his research uncovered.
Migrants in hotels, citizens in tents
“We have citizens of our own country that I’ve engaged in North Carolina weeks and weeks after the disaster that have some of those same needs,” Graves said.
Reports out of the Tar Heel state confirm his testimony, with impacted residents living in tent cities to this day.
Under a stunning $35 trillion dollar debt, Graves concluded, “we’re out there using our own taxpayer dollars” to help out “citizens of other countries when we’re not even meeting the fundamental needs of our own citizens.”
US Representative Marc Molinaro similarly used his time to point out the agency’s disparate priorities.
Referring to a capped immediate relief check for impacted residents, he laid out the starkly different pipelines for aid to citizens versus migrants:
“Do you see the absurdity that American citizens are getting their $750 and then struggling through a very complicated process to meet the thresholds necessary to get the aid they need […] while your agency is contracting with not-for-profits to easily hand out access to those who are placed here illegally?”
“I want us to be a welcoming nation,” he espoused. “But if we cannot respond to those who are living in emergencies, then we do not have the right to claim that we are the Federal Emergency Management Administration.”
Shunned government gossip
Molinaro also addressed a complaint surfaced by Administrator Criswell: the widespread criticism of FEMA’s recent efforts.
Earlier in the hearing, Criswell had lambasted the public for what she deems misinformation. She applauded FEMA’s workforce for “persevering through a difficult security environment,” thanks to information spread through social media.
“We help all survivors, all people, obtain all of the assistance that they are qualified for under the law,” Criswell touted. “Misinformation is making that work much more difficult.”
“Misinformation is freedom of speech, whether it’s true or not,” Molinaro clapped back.
“But you know what fuels misinformation?” he continued. “The inequity that FEMA has engaged in, because it allows for people to assume either a level of incompetence, inefficiency, or lack or concern for those who are struggling the most.”
For instance, a FEMA executive order demands workers to consider “impacts on people based on things like race, gender, and sexual orientation.”
Treat MAGA like dogs
Contrary to Criswell’s notion of equality, FEMA has recently come under fire after it was leaked that federal relief workers in Florida were advised to skip over houses with Trump signage—similar to how they treat homes with dogs—if an employee feels “uncomfortable.”
One particular crew leader, Marn’i Washington, was thrown under the bus and sanctimoniously fired under the premise that she was a lone actor in a politically-motivated event.
Washington has since made media appearances denouncing this rhetoric, and pinning the situation on the administration at large.
“FEMA always preaches avoidance first,” she explained to journalist Roland Martin. “So this is not isolated—this is a colossal event of avoidance, not just in the state of Florida, but you will find avoidance in the Carolinas.”
Washington has also demanded that FEMA provide incident reports that will prove she’s a scapegoat.
“Senior leadership will lie to you and tell you that they do not know, but if you ask the DSA crew leads and specialists what they are experiencing in the field, they will tell you.”
Administrator Criswell doubled down on FEMA’s original narrative during the hearing, calling it “an isolated incident that has not gone beyond” one employee.
Virtue signals missing
Remember when reports of illegal migrants in tent city conditions during Trump’s first presidency sent Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez to cry along a fence in El Paso, Texas?
Presumably, AOC would be fired up on behalf of Americans who now endure similar conditions. I guess her anguish only extends to non-citizens, as it was reported that AOC made good use of the Oversight hearing by getting her makeup done.
Why are the Democrats, the supposed party of social justice, silent on Hurricane Helene?
Disappearing migrant children
Moreover, why aren’t they outraged over the record-breaking number of migrant children lost at the border?
Perhaps AOC was too busy applying her lip gloss when retired Border Patrol agent of 24 years J.J. Carrell testified “without reservation, that the United States federal government is the world’s largest child sex trafficking organization in modern history.”
Upwards of 325,000 migrant children have been intentionally trafficked, according to Carrell:
“I state with complete certainty that Biden, Harris, and Mayorkas are intentionally, strategically, and purposely weaponizing illegal immigration and using it as a tool to fundamentally transform America. Inside this invasion, the unspoken evil of child trafficking and more specifically child sex trafficking has flourished.”
Representative Chip Roy dug into the issue further when he questioned the Health and Human Services Secretary Xavier Becerra.
“Mr Secretary, how can you credibly claim that HHS is working to protect these children?” Roy then cited a figure beyond 400,000, which includes another ~85,000 children who were unaccounted for in 2023.
“We lose custody of those kids once we find a vetted sponsor with whom they can stay,” Becerra responded.
“A vetted sponsor that rapes and murders the people that they’re entrusted to, because you issue a rule that doesn’t even do the background check?” Roy retorted. “That’s what you think is appropriate care for these children?”
Hide your kids, hide your campsites
If Mayorkas and the Biden-Harris regime are indeed behind a child trafficking operation, could you imagine handing your children over to the state?
Back in North Carolina, this is actually happening.
Children of impacted families are now being stripped from their parents by police and placed in foster care, even being separated from siblings in the process.
Although numerous applicants for the $750 immediate relief check were reportedly denied, this doesn’t stop their names from being put on a FEMA check-up list.
According to Asheville resident and former Department of Energy employee Matt Van Swol, local parents have reported FEMA personnel unexpectedly showing up at their makeshift family campsites, even on personal land, and declaring it an “unsafe situation.”
These workers can then coordinate the delivery of a mobile housing unit, which unfortunately does not arrive sooner than the DHS workers deployed to investigate these unacceptable living conditions.
When police ultimately show up to take the kids into foster care custody, it’s justified as protecting them. The thing is, the problematic living conditions wouldn’t exist, had these families gotten sufficient help in a reasonable time.
If those of us paying attention have learned anything from trafficking survivor Ally Carter, it’s that multiple points of our systems are severely compromised to aid the pervasive underground trafficking network. This includes police, social workers, and foster parents.
Smoke and mirrors
Immediately following Tuesday’s hearing, FEMA released a fluff piece video touring their mobile housing unit product, which they claim to have 100 ready to assist NC families in need.
This is, of course, after impacted residents go through the complicated red tape of applying for assistance, which requires access to power and an internet connection.
Van Swol reports that at the time of the video release, nearly two months after the disaster, only four units had been delivered to families in need. Four.
Greedy government
It’s already difficult enough for struggling North Carolinians to get approved for a $750 relief check, so you can imagine the hoops they must jump through to receive more extensive coverage.
Although FEMA allegedly provides up to $40,000 in additional support, approval requires an in-person appraisal that isn’t exactly lenient, or unbiased.
Not-so-ironically, these home inspections are funded by a BlackRock- and Vanguard-controlled entity. These two global behemoths have a vested interest (and active government contract) in mining Asheville-area lithium deposits through Albemarle Corporation, which has been fiercely opposed by locals.
Maybe that’s why several reports out of North Carolina cited civilian rescue and clean-up efforts being thwarted by FEMA and local authorities.
A recent video filmed in former downtown Asheville shows the River Arts District still completely destroyed and neglected, a scene now familiar to locals living in stagnancy.
Like the land grab in Lahaina, Hawaii after the fires last year, there may not be a meaningful recovery response because the area was meant to be destroyed and eventually seized by the government.
Reportedly, FEMA is now declaring certain areas of North Carolina unlivable “flood zones” and offering landowners deals for pennies on what their deeds are worth.
Karma to pay
Not all is doom and gloom—at least the government was willing to drop $400,000 to build the residents of Asheville a single-unit public bathroom.
I hope it helps local parents to get their kids back!
Mayorkas, on the other hand, might be feeling the pressure of his actions… and I sure hope he and his regime allies receive the consequences they deserve.
…And I sure hope he and his regime allies receive the consequences they deserve.
