Because as the sun rises over central Texas today, residents are still grieving the loss of at least 120 people across six counties after storms surged through the region nearly one week ago. A desperate search by air, water, land and even horseback continues at this hour, [00:00:15] as officials say more than 170 people are still missing. So as the death toll continues to rise following the deadly floods that hit central Texas almost a week ago, new reporting reveals the federal response to the flooding was significantly delayed [00:00:33] due to Kristi Noem's new FEMA policies. So Jank was and I talked about this story a little bit yesterday, specifically about how Governor Abbott doesn't want to investigate what went wrong, where with the flood and the response to it, because according to him, [00:00:50] that is something that only losers do. But this part of the story broke right before we went live yesterday. So it turns out that as much as Abbott is insisting that no one is to blame for the inadequate response to the victims and the situation. [00:01:05] There does seem to be some blame to be had. - What do you think? - Yeah. So no matter which political party, whenever a politician says we shouldn't investigate this, that means you should investigate it. He's definitely trying to hide something. And oh, look at that. When there was wildfires in California, they were like, [00:01:21] oh, Karen Bass, Gavin Newsom. We need investigations. This is incompetence. It happens in Texas. There are. No investigations. Don't look into it at all. Well, it turns out because the minute you look into it, you find out, oh my God, it was Kristi Noem's fault. [00:01:38] So I was not inclined in that direction. That's why I'm actually a bit shocked at how brazen and over the top this story is, because it was definitely her fault that they didn't get there in time. They're going to ruin FEMA. It was one of the I know that you heard, like if you're on the right, [00:01:54] you heard propaganda about FEMA. No, no, it was one of the few things in government that was working. - So watch how they're destroying it now. - Yeah, the story really is egregious. So according to four FEMA officials who spoke to CNN yesterday, [00:02:11] FEMA was not allowed to deploy their urban search and rescue crews until they got the sign off from Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem, which did not come until Monday, which was 72 hours after the flooding began. So last month, CNN reported that Kristi Noem enacted a new rule stating [00:02:30] that every contract and grant over $100, 000 across her department must get her personal sign off in order for any of those funds to be released. So this is from CNN, says officials inside FEMA warned the new approval process [00:02:45] could severely disrupt the distribution of emergency funds during natural disasters. With hurricane season already underway, multiple sources told CNN that Noem's policy threatens to bog down FEMA's rapid response efforts and could choke [00:03:01] off critical aid when every second counts. One FEMA official directly involved in disaster response called the policy a dramatic and unprecedented overreach, and contends that Noem is effectively preventing the governor, the department, from functioning. [00:03:18] So they also added that this will hurt non-profits, states and small towns. Massive delays feel inevitable. So for FEMA, disaster response can regularly soar into the billions due to their contracts with crews who are working on the ground. [00:03:35] So a $100,000 threshold is pennies. It's peanuts. They can hit that threshold very, very quickly. Once a disaster has occurred, and it's no surprise that they were right about all of these delays. So, for example, as central Texas towns were submerged in rising waters, [00:03:52] FEMA officials realized they could not pre-position urban search and rescue crews from a network of teams stationed regionally across the country, across the country. And additionally, Texas did request aerial imagery from FEMA [00:04:07] to aid search and rescue operations. A source told CNN, but that was delayed as it awaited Noems approval for the necessary contract. FEMA staff have also been answering phones at a disaster call center where, according to one agency official, [00:04:22] callers have faced longer wait times as the agency awaited Noems approval for a contract to bring in additional support staff. By Monday night, only 86 FEMA staffers had been deployed. By Tuesday, it expanded to 311, still just a fraction of the typical disaster [00:04:42] response that they would have deployed. One longtime FEMA official had this to say. They said we were operating under a clear set of guidance. Lean forward, be prepared, anticipate what the state needs and be ready to deliver it. That is not as clear of an intent for us at the moment. [00:05:00] And following the report. Tricia McLaughlin, a DHS spokesperson, told CNN that Noem did not need to authorize additional FEMA resources initially because the department used other DHS search and rescue assets. She added that over time, as a need for FEMA resources arose, [00:05:19] those requests received Noem's approval. She said FEMA is shifting from bloated, DC centric dead weight to a lean, deployable disaster force that empowers state actors to provide relief for their citizens. The old processes are being replaced because they failed Americans [00:05:37] in real emergencies for decades. This isn't exactly the instance that that point is being proven. So Kristi Noem herself did not deny the fact that she did delay the process. Take a look. CNN is basically got a report accusing you of slowing the process. [00:05:56] - Would you like to respond to that? - Well, there you go. Fake news CNN again is absolutely trash. What they are doing by saying that because our Coast Guard, our Border Patrol Bortac teams were there immediately. Every single thing I was on, they asked for. We were there. The governor and the emergency management director, Nim Kidd, are fantastic, and [00:06:16] nobody there has said anything about that. They didn't get everything that they wanted immediately or that they needed. The fact that CNN is continuing to be political and push out fake information and false information and lies is not shocking, [00:06:33] but it's a disservice to the country. It's a real disservice to the country because people start to mistrust anything that comes out then over the news and then. Well that's true. Yeah. But they, they they just don't trust anybody anymore. [00:06:49] All right. Well, this comes after Noam actually called for the entire agency to be eliminated yet again. It says on Wednesday, Noam called for the agency to be eliminated and remade after telling reporters the previous day, we as a federal government [00:07:04] don't manage these disasters. The state does. That's not true. We come in and support them. And that's exactly what we did in this situation. It's also not really true. Luckily, Texas was able to handle the situation for the most part despite the delay from FEMA. [00:07:21] So Texas, which has one of the most robust emergency management systems in the country, has managed this disaster largely on its own and leaned on its state and local search and rescue teams in the early hours of the disaster. More than 2100 people have been deployed across 20 state agencies, according [00:07:39] to Governor Greg Abbott's office. So, you know, people were actively dying as all this was going on. This is completely unacceptable. And what's worse is that FEMA was trying to act. They were trying to do their jobs, and they found that they were being kneecapped. [00:07:55] They just could not do the things that they needed to do, the things that they knew they needed to do. When you have a situation where there is an acute weather situation, I think the river rose 20ft in under an hour. That is unbelievable. You don't have time for bureaucracy. [00:08:11] Every minute counts. And I thought that this administration wanted to get rid of needless bureaucracy. But yet here we are with a situation where they just can't act for some kind of administrative reason, a reason that was not there just a little while ago. But now no one is trying to spin this as like this is a states versus fed issue, [00:08:32] which is par for the course with this administration, because I feel like if it was up to them, the federal government would essentially just be a bank in a military like her. Lack of accountability here is not surprising. But Jake, what do you think about her overall response to this? Not just her lack of accountability, but also like the state [00:08:49] versus federal government issue? Yeah. So the river rises 20ft in an hour, then they have to wait 71 more hours for her to approve any spending over $100,000. [00:09:05] You guys grasp how stupid that rule is. They spend billions in these, FEMA recovery situations, especially one as severe as this, where over 120 people died. $100,000 for you and I is a lot of money. But for FEMA, you can't do anything with $100,000. [00:09:21] That means she has to basically okay, every single expenditure. And it took her three interminable days. It's unbelievable how long that is in an emergency. It's just the worst judgment you've seen. Except there's one other thing that Noem did in her life [00:09:38] that makes you go, oh, right, right. She's the one with the terrible judgment. I'll go back to that in a second. But, guys, so the Republicans have been doing propaganda against FEMA and and with Kristi Noem here, you're seeing that that propaganda doesn't make any sense. It it clashes with the other things that they're saying. [00:09:57] So what happened was whenever there's a, you know, some sort of disaster in red states over the last, this is a recent phenomenon around when Trump started around ten years ago or so, when it's in a red state that Ted Cruz comes back from vacation three days later and. [00:10:12] Said, we need all the money. All the money has to come to us right away, right away. - FEMA, FEMA. - FEMA, right. And then in North Carolina, for example, they started this thing about how FEMA is going to come to your house and do something bad to you. And then a couple of FEMA people were like, I don't know if I want to go to Trump Houses. [00:10:28] They're all riled up to, like, are they angry at us? I don't know if they're going to attack us, etc.. And they decide not to go to a couple houses. That terrible decision that's your job is to go help those people, right? But then they take those microscopic cases and they're like, that's that. FEMA's bad. [00:10:43] Abolish FEMA, and especially if it's in a blue state, a disaster happened. Ted Cruz then comes out and say, no way, not going to fund it. No way Tommy Tuberville comes out and goes blue states. Who cares? Abolish FEMA. And no, now he's talking about abolish FEMA. You're in charge of FEMA. And how can you say FEMA under me? [00:11:02] FEMA is perfectly responsive and awesome and terrific, and that's why we should get rid of it. You're not even trying to make sense. I mean, look, I was against defund the police. I was against abolish Ice. Those are slogans that make you think that there's going to be [00:11:18] no border control or no cops. Now the Republicans are doing abolish FEMA. And by the way, they're literally doing it. Those are like, hey, we should reduce funding and give it to another organization. ET cetera. ET cetera. This is like, no, not only do we think we should abolish FEMA if you're [00:11:33] in Texas and 120 of you died, I'm going to wait 72 hours before I let them spend a dollar on you. Because I don't really care about you guys. Why do they even want to abolish FEMA? It's like. So yeah, it's had some terrible moments like Hurricane Katrina, etc. [00:11:49] But overall, there's a lot of emergencies these days, natural disasters, partly because of climate change and in my estimation, and believe me, I mean, if you watch The Young Turks at all, I criticize a lot of government actions, right? But FEMA has been pretty good. [00:12:06] They get to the areas relatively quickly. Normally they get people help right away. It's one of the few things in government that actually works. Not perfectly, but pretty good, right? So why did the Republicans even start an attack on FEMA? [00:12:21] Because it only helps the average American. It doesn't help any executives at all. No corporate CEO is going to get rich off of FEMA. No one has any special interest involved. FEMA doesn't have any lobbyists. It usually helps poor and middle class people whose houses have been wiped out [00:12:38] through a natural disaster. The oil companies don't even like it. They don't like this talk of climate change and all that stuff. Right? So to the average American abolish FEMA. They didn't even donate to us. - They're not. - Even a. Corporation. These people in Texas. [00:12:55] This is stupid and disgusting. So finally, are we surprised that the woman who thought not only will I murder a dog in a gravel pit, but I'll put it in my book so everyone knows about it, had the infinitely [00:13:12] bad judgment to say, hey, you know what? In the case of emergencies, you should wait 72 hours for me to authorize the tiniest little spending while everyone is dying. No, not at all. Surprising clown through and through. [00:13:29] Yeah, I really don't understand that 72 hour response like this thing was in the news way before that, right? I think the flooding started last Thursday or Friday night. It was in the news the next day. Right? We knew what was going on, especially here in Texas. We knew it was going on. I don't there's no excuse for it. [00:13:47] There's no reason why something like this would take 72 hours, especially like, as you you spelled out, it is such a small amount of money. Why does that need to even be approved? And, like, if you see that there's flooding in Texas, just say, yeah, have the money, like, whatever. [00:14:03] Also you're you're right. Like this is hurricane season. We are here in Texas, all on the Gulf Coast, all along the East Coast, even on the West Coast. Now you guys are getting more hurricanes than before. This is not great timing for any of this. There's a lot of concern, especially I know here in Houston. [00:14:19] It's a big concern that we're just not going to get the money or the aid that we need. If and when these things happen and these things inevitably will happen, it's really just a matter of time as to when something's going to hit. And, you know, in the past, FEMA has been there to to help people out. [00:14:36] Whenever there's times of crisis. It's like what you said, right? It's never perfect, right? But a lot of times it is the thing that gets people through. It is the thing that gets the city through. And in Texas, we do have what they say. One of the most robust emergency response systems in the country. [00:14:52] That is because we need it, right? We have a lot of we have a lot of weird weather here in Texas. But at the same time, we're not the federal government. Like we don't have billions and billions of dollars to spend on, you know, if if a hurricane hits and that is how much it costs, I think for Hurricane Harvey, it was like over $100 billion [00:15:10] that it cost in recovery. Also, on that note, they also seem very hesitant to install any kind of preventative things. That would be a lot cheaper, but you can't justify that cost because, you know, $100,000. [00:15:25] Let's just say as an example, let's go with $1 million, right? $1 million, a preventative money just feels like money. You don't have to pay because there's no acute need for it. But, you know, a hurricane comes then it costs $125 billion. Like, I don't know, the numbers don't really make sense to me there. [00:15:43] Also in Kerr County, we did hear that there were calls from that, from local, officials in that area who were saying we need to do something about our emergency response and our flood response system because it is wildly obsolete or non-existent. [00:16:01] And that is one of the most flood prone areas in the entire state. And, you know, they never got the funding for it. And now we had this disaster happen, and they they were unable to respond the way they might have been able to. Again, it is hard to point fingers because like this thing happens so, so rapidly, [00:16:19] it's very hard to wrap your head around. And like the I saw a video of the river and it's just like in my head and just like how quickly it was, the water was rising. And, you know, you have to do everything you can in advance to prevent the absolute worst from happening. [00:16:35] And that's just simply not what we saw here today or last week. Last word goes to one of our members, Avenger, Dragon 89, wrote in on Twitch. My dad died when he saved four people when a creek flooded. Search and rescue was likely near $100,000 for. [00:16:53] Well, now you got to wait three days. The river flooded right away as, he was telling you. But then to wait 72 hours to authorize any kind of spending is. [00:17:09] It's just nuts. Totally nuts. Every time you ring the bell below, an angel gets its wings. Totally not true. But it does keep you updated on our live shows.