Senator JD Vance (R-OH) did his best to unravel the media spin surrounding the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and the Biden-Harris administration’s response to Hurricane Helene.
Vance joined Monday morning’s broadcast of “Fox & Friends” and responded to critics who claimed that money FEMA was using to subsidize the resettlement of illegal migrants had come from a different “bucket of money” than emergency funding for the American citizens still reeling from the devastation wrought by Helene across the southeastern United States.
WATCH:
.@JDVance: “They’ll say, ‘Well there’s bucket of money in FEMA that’s gone to illegal aliens & that’s somehow separate than the bucket of money that should by right go to Americans. I think that misses the fundamental point, that the Biden-Harris admin has turned FEMA effectively… pic.twitter.com/pzm4DjoV5r
— Tom Elliott (@tomselliott) October 7, 2024
Fox News host Will Cain presented the question, noting that there had been a number of “conflicting reports” and confusion surrounding FEMA — which reportedly does not have enough funding to last through the remainder of hurricane season — and whether or not the money designated for resettling illegal immigrants could have been used instead for those impacted by Helene.
“They’ll say, ‘Well there’s a bucket of money in FEMA that’s gone to illegal aliens and that’s somehow separate than the bucket of money that should —by right — go to Americans,'” Vance began, parroting the official talking point. The narrative, he explained, appeared to be that because the Biden-Harris administration had previously designated some FEMA money to be used for illegal migrant resettlement, using those FEMA funds for illegal immigrants was not a slap in the face to the American citizens who were in need after the hurricane.
“I think that misses the fundamental point, that the Biden-Harris administration has turned FEMA effectively into an agency that helps to settle, helps to deal with illegal immigration,” Vance said arguing that the larger sticking point in his mind was the fact that FEMA funds had ever been designated to be used for illegal migrants rather than American citizens. “That is just going to fundamentally distract focus from their core job of helping American citizens in their time of need.”
