Ousted FEMA chief describes ‘very hostile relationship’ with DHS officials

Former acting FEMA Administrator Cameron Hamilton said he had “a very hostile relationship” with Department of Homeland Security (DHS) officials during an interview last week. 

“When my character started being attacked, and then I was polygraphed, and then I passed, and there was no apology … it became a very hostile relationship” Hamilton told former FEMA official John Scardena on the Disaster Tough podcast on Wednesday.

Hamilton was fired this past May, just one day after he told congressional lawmakers that eliminating FEMA was not in the public’s best interests. 

Hamilton’s comments contradicted President Trump’s assertions that the agency should be either overhauled or eliminated entirely. Trump has expressed a desire to shift more responsibility for disaster preparedness to states.

“I was not hired to abolish FEMA. That was never part of the conversation, and that’s never something I would have agreed with. And I was very clear. I wanted some reform. I want to cut wasteful spending. I wanted to downsize the agency,” Hamilton said. 

Hamilton, a former Navy SEAL and director of emergency medical services at DHS, was appointed as acting FEMA administrator on Jan. 22. In March, Hamilton was reportedly ordered by DHS to take a polygraph test regarding whether he leaked information on a private meeting concerning FEMA to Politico’s E&E News and CNN.

Trump criticized FEMA upon taking office and even teased an executive order shutting the agency down. 

“I had a gradual phasing out, because I also had concerns that FEMA had been forced into a scenario to assume more and more state responsibility,” Hamilton said. “We needed to give the states some time to see what that entails and to respond accordingly. Not just, ‘Hey, the water’s now shut off, you’re on our own.’ That’s not wise.”

DHS Secretary Kristi Noem, who oversees the agency, echoed the president’s rhetoric during a May 25 Cabinet meeting, saying, “we’re going to eliminate FEMA.” But last month, Noem touted $96 million in FEMA grants to North Carolina communities impacted by Hurricane Helene last year. 

“There’s so much reform that can be done within FEMA, and that’s a bipartisan issue,” Hamilton noted. “Whether you’re progressive or conservative or anywhere in between on the political spectrum, pretty much universally across FEMA there was a shared concern over a lot of internal requirements, statutes and thing that should be amended or should be modified.”

David Richardson, who was appointed in January to assistant secretary for DHS’s Countering Weapons of Mass Destruction Office, replaced Hamilton as acting FEMA administrator.

The Hill has reached out to the White House, DHS and FEMA for comment.