Funding
his fake disaster by stealing from real ones
While scientists warn that the
climate crisis will continue to cause increasingly damaging weather events and
disasters in U.S. communities, President Donald Trump made clear Friday his
focus on a separate, invented "crisis" as he ordered officials to
consider redirecting billions of dollars in disaster relief funds to pay for a
wall at the southern U.S. border.
According to the Associated
Press, the White House asked the Army Corps of Engineers to examine
its budget, including $13.9 billion in emergency funds, to determine how much
money it could spend to help build the wall Trump promised his supporters.
The emergency funds had been set
aside for California in the wake of devastating wildfires that tore through 1.8 million acres in the state
this year, as well as Puerto Rico, Texas, and Florida as they continue to
recover from 2017 and 2018's hurricanes and prepare for similar storms in the
coming years.
"Siphoning funding from real
disasters to pay for a crisis manufactured by the president is wholly
unacceptable and the American people won't fall for it," said Velazquez in
a statement.
"My Democratic colleagues
in Congress and I will fight such a move with every ounce of energy we
have."
According to the Houston
Chronicle, the report of Trump's plans left city and county officials
"scrambling to figure out how local flood control plans would be
affected" by the White House proposal, a year and a half after Hurricane
Harvey devastated parts of Houston.
Trump indicated Thursday during a
trip to the border that he was planning to declare a national emergency in
order to free up funds to build the wall, which is supported by only 41 percent of Americans,
according to a recent Reuters-Ipsos poll.
Democrats in Congress have refused to
approve a spending bill that includes the $5.7 billion Trump has demanded for
the wall.
As the president toyed with the idea
of taking badly-needed funds to pay for the effects of the climate crisis—which
he has denied exists—and Senate Majority Leader
Mitch McConnell blocked Democrats' attempts to take up
legislation to reopen the government, 800,000 Americans were continued to
cope with the various and negative impacts of the
shutdown. On Friday, those government employees on furlough or working without
pay received no paycheck even as hundreds of thousands of them continue to
report for work.