FEMA’s Trump Supporter Omission & Border Surge Potential | 11.11.24
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A FEMA official is caught directing hurricane relief workers to skip Trump-supporting homes, sparking calls for investigations and a congressional hearing. FEMA was very quick to say this was an isolated incident, but I'm quite a bit skeptical of that. We discuss the furious fallout and the bombshell Daily Wire report that sparked it all.

I'm Daily Wire Editor-in-Chief John Bickley with Georgia Howe. It's Monday, November 11th. Happy Veterans Day. And this is Morning Wire.

President-elect Trump has begun to build his cabinet. Who's expected to be in and who's definitely out? They're going to have the pick of the litter in putting together a fantastic team to help drive our country forward. And reports point towards a surge in illegal immigrants before Trump's big return to the White House. Thanks for waking up with Morning Wire. Stay tuned. We have the news you need to know.

Hey guys, producer Brandon here. This Veterans Week, fuel yourself with purpose from Black Rifle Coffee Company. As America's leading veteran founded coffee company, they're offering an unprecedented 30% off everything from November 8th through the 14th. Every purchase helps fund vital support for veteran and first responder causes across the nation. Head over to BlackRifleCoffee.com now to shop their full line of premium roasts, patriotic gear, and American made merchandise at 30% off.

That's BlackRifleCoffee.com for 30% off this Veterans Week. Black Rifle Coffee, America's coffee. A bombshell Daily Wire report has revealed that FEMA relief workers skipped homes with pro-Trump signs at the direction of leadership in the wake of Hurricane Milton. The report has triggered multiple investigations and the firing of one FEMA official.

Here to discuss is Daily Wire reporter Amanda Prestigiacomo. Hey, Amanda. So this story was first reported by the Daily Wire's Leif LeMahieu on Friday, but a lot has unfolded since then. Let's start from the top. What exactly happened here? Well, it's pretty unbelievable, John, but internal communication shows that a FEMA official ordered workers to skip the homes of Trump supporters as they were surveying damage caused by Hurricane Milton in Florida.

A FEMA supervisor named Marnie Washington told workers in a message to bypass Trump supporters' homes as they were identifying residents who could qualify for federal aid. Multiple government employees said Washington gave those orders both verbally and in a group chat used by the relief team. In one example of that written guidance, under best practices, it said, quote, avoid homes advertising Trump. So an explicit directive to avoid Trump supporters. Right.

Right. And these orders were actually followed. They were. The Daily Wire obtained images of the system used by federal relief workers to track what homes they visited, and several addresses were marked as not able to access property. But when they listed their explanation, they said it was because the residents at the home supported Trump. Here are just a few examples of these explanations. Quote, Trump signed no entry per leadership.

Another simply said Trump sign. At least 20 homes with Trump signs or flags were skipped from the end of October into November due to that directive. So those Trump supporters, no matter how badly they suffered, they were not given the opportunity to qualify for FEMA assistance. Truly stunning. So at least 20 homes discriminated against. Let's get to the fallout of all this. Things have been unfolding very rapidly. What's transpired so far?

Well, first, FEMA has not only confirmed that this is true, they've also confirmed that they fired Marnie Washington, the supervisor who gave that directive. FEMA Administrator Deanne Criswell said on Saturday that Washington's actions were a, quote, "...clear violation of FEMA's core values and principles to help people regardless of their political affiliation."

The agency told The Daily Wire that those skipped homes will receive visits from FEMA, you know, obviously weeks later. Right. And as Lemahieu, who broke the story, told us, we still need to find out how deep this all went. There are still a lot of questions about who in the federal government was aware of the guidance and when and what they knew about it. A whistleblower complaint was filed with the Department of Homeland Security on October 27. But there's no action to discipline Washington until after The Daily Wire report was

Before the report, federal employees told me Washington was simply moved to a different county. Federal and state lawmakers are now calling for investigations into FEMA. Florida Governor Ron DeSantis, for example, announced that his state's Division of Emergency Management will be investigating the incident, which he called blatant weaponization of government.

The House Committee on Homeland Security also promised an investigation. And the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability will be holding a hearing to investigate FEMA on November 19th. And FEMA Administrator Criswell has been asked to testify. The Daily Wire has spoken to several lawmakers demanding action. Here's what Alabama Senator Katie Britt told us.

Ensuring accountability from the agency, I believe, is critical, especially if Congress considers additional disaster relief funding. Needless to say that FEMA of all agencies would be weaponized against Americans who vote for the wrong candidate. It sent shockwaves throughout the country. Yeah, truly alarming scandal here. We'll see what these investigations uncover. Amanda, thanks for reporting.

That's shopify.com slash morningwire.

Following his resounding victory last week, President-elect Trump is preparing for his second term in office. Here to discuss his picks for cabinet and his plans for the first 100 days is Daily Wire senior editor Cabot Phillips. Hey, Cabot. So first, we have the final remaining votes still being counted. What's the latest? Well, Donald Trump has now officially swept all seven battleground states and maintains a stunning 4 million vote lead in the popular vote. So,

That is the largest popular vote victory for a Republican in nearly four decades. And get this, compared to 2020, he gained ground in 49 of 50 states. And as new exit polling comes in, we're starting to get a better idea of how he pulled off that blowout victory.

First, Democrats had expected abortion and protecting democracy to lead them to victory, but clearly it did not work. Among the plurality of voters who said that abortion should be, quote, legal in most cases, Trump and Harris were actually tied 49 to 49. Even in battleground states like Nevada and Arizona, where voters approved separate abortion measures on the ballot, Harris still lost. And according to CNN, among voters who felt, quote, democracy was threatened this election, Trump won by a seven-point margin.

And one more interesting note for all the Democrats talk of J.D. Vance being, quote, weird. If you look at NBC exit polling, he was the only candidate on the ballot with a positive approval rating. Yeah. In fact, the weird moniker really ended up sticking on Harris's pick walls. Right now, we're also getting the final results from the House and Senate races nearly a week out at this point. How are things shaping up there?

Well, control of the House still very much hangs in the balance, though it does look like Republicans will maintain their majority. At latest count, there are around 10 races yet to be called. Republicans need to win just two of them in order to retain control.

In the other chamber, Republicans have already won control of the Senate. We're still waiting for the final race to be called just to see how big that majority will be. Some outlets have called Pennsylvania for Republican Dave McCormick. That would get them to 53 seats. But Democrat Bob Casey has so far refused to concede, despite that result looking obvious at this point. Yeah. Now the big question out of the Senate becomes who will replace Mitch McConnell to become the new majority leader?

It appears to be a three-man race between Florida's Rick Scott, South Dakota's John Thune, and Texas's John Cornyn.

That position, remember, will be of critical importance this year as the Senate will be the ones confirming Trump cabinet appointments. Right, a consequential decision for the GOP for sure. So let's get to the cabinet. Who are we hearing? Well, first, we know two people who won't be a part of the administration. The president-elect issued a statement Saturday announcing that Nikki Haley and Mike Pompeo, who previously served as U.N. ambassador and CIA director, would not be returning to his staff.

As for who will be there, Trump's first move was to appoint Susie Wiles, one of his campaign managers, as chief of staff. Wiles will become the first woman to ever hold that position.

From there, it is a lot of conjecture, but let's have some fun. The names we're hearing for Secretary of State include former Director of National Intelligence Rick Grinnell and Senators Marco Rubio and Bill Hagerty. Utah Senator Mike Lee is reportedly the favorite for Attorney General. We're also hearing it could be another former Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe. For Secretary of Defense, Florida Congressman and frequent Morning Wire guest Mike Waltz looks to have the inside track.

But again, with more than 15 department heads and thousands of other appointments to make, there's no real way of knowing who will be picked. We'll just have to wait and see. Yeah, a lot to track over the next few months. So we're starting to get a better idea of what Trump will do on day one. Tell us about that.

Yeah, because the Biden-Harris administration relied so heavily on executive orders as opposed to actual legislation, Trump will be able to quickly roll back many of their policies on day one, especially on the border. Trump has vowed to immediately bring back immigration policies like remain in Mexico that had resulted in historically low numbers of illegal border crossings under his watch.

He's also vowed to implement a zero tolerance policy for border crossers. That means those called entering will be immediately deported. Remember, for the last four years, millions of folks were caught entering illegally, but they weren't detained. They were released into the country anyway. And perhaps most notably, the president-elect has said that he will sign an executive order putting an end to birthright citizenship.

Now, that will almost certainly face major legal challenges, as the 14th Amendment says, quote, all persons born or naturalized in the United States are citizens of the United States. But the Trump team says they're confident they can win in court. And all of that is just on immigration. We've got a whole lot more coming on foreign policy, the economy, energy. The list goes on. And we certainly won't be lacking for things to cover in the next few months. Cabot, thanks for reporting. Anytime.

Biden administration officials are concerned that Donald Trump's election could spur a rush on the U.S. southern border. Daily Wire reporter Tim Pierce is here to talk about concerns of a surge at the border and to preview Trump's immigration policy. So, Tim, first off, tell us about the possibility of a flood of immigrants between now and when Trump takes office.

Sure. So according to NBC News, Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas and other top officials in his department met the day before the election. The discussion was on a possible immigration surge at the border should Trump win the election. Of course, Trump did win. So now Homeland Security officials believe that many immigrants now plan to rush the border, hoping to get into the U.S. before Trump takes office.

There's a strong perception among those trying to get into the country from the South that Trump's border policies will be much tougher than Biden's and that Trump will close those greatly expanded parole programs that the Biden administration has used to let, at least temporarily, tens of thousands of migrants enter the country. And WhatsApp group chats from immigrants show this. Messages reviewed by NBC News show immigrants trying to get into the U.S. before Trump gets into office.

They look at January 20th as the deadline to cross the border. And how much of a surge do officials expect?

That's hard to say, not least because we don't have solid data on immigrants in Mexico. But a report from Todd Benzman at the Center for Immigration Studies suggests it could be hundreds of thousands. To understand what could come, listeners should be aware of what has been going on in Mexico for about the past year. Around the end of last year, the Mexican government agreed to restrict the number of migrants traveling north. It did that by essentially rounding up migrants in its north and busing them down to cities in the south.

This process has been going on since January, and it's had an impact here in the U.S. Encounters at the southern border dropped from over 10,000 a day in December to around 4,000 to 5,000 in January. Now, to go back to Benzman's reporting, that process has been going on for months while immigrants continue to stream into Mexico from the south. So pressure has continued to build, and Benzman has been in southern Mexico watching it.

One newspaper publisher he talked to in Tapachula, Mexico, estimated that 150,000 immigrants were in the city waiting to move north. The city of Villa Hermosa also has a large immigrant population waiting. All it takes is for Mexico to take the pressure off its busing program, and most of those people could be at the U.S. southern border in a couple months. Now, what has President Trump said his plan is going to be once he takes office?

Well, Trump campaigned on the largest deportation effort in U.S. history. And we should note he did uncommonly well with Latinos despite Democrats counter-messaging on the deportation issue specifically. Here's Luis Figueroa, the vice chair of the Republican National Hispanic Assembly, explaining why on CNN on Thursday.

So the first thing that we need to do is close the border. More than 10 million people illegally entered the country. They have to be deportation. There is no other way around. They have to be deportation. They have to be not deportation camps. Respect the laws. Do you want to see people in camps rounded up and put in camps? Isn't that what you voted for? Isn't that what you voted for?

There are in camps now. More than 300,000 children are missing. So they're in camps now. Now, on how mass deportation could work practically, there are a few different tools the Trump administration could use. Vice President-elect Vance has said in interviews that illegal aliens with criminal histories will be the priority for forced removal. Many others, according to Vance, can be made to self-deport through rules on government assistance and wages.

Some of the groundwork is already being laid. CNN reports that some of Trump's allies are already looking for space to use as detention centers for those to be deported. Well, we'll see how effective it is. We have 10 million illegal immigrants in this country as of now, and that's probably an undercount. Tim, thanks for reporting. Good to be on.

Hey, before we go this morning, we'd like to take a moment to thank all the men and women who served our country and put their lives on the line for all of us. Thank you so much for your service. If you haven't listened to our special Veterans Day episode yet, it's just below this one on the feed. Thanks for waking up with us. We'll be back later this afternoon with more news you need to know.