The Biden administration is asking Congress to approve an additional $4 billion to replenish the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s Disaster Relief Fund, which has been taxed by a brutal stretch of extreme weather across the country this year.
The request, made Friday, is in addition to the $12 billion in emergency spending that President Biden asked Congress to provide last month. It also comes one day after Mr. Biden called on Congress to pass more relief funds for FEMA during remarks on Hurricane Idalia, which left a trail of devastation across several southern states.
“Given the intensity of disaster activity around the nation — including fires on Maui, in Louisiana and across the country, massive flooding in Vermont and now a major hurricane that hit Florida and the Southeast — the administration is seeking an additional $4 billion for FEMA’s Disaster Relief Fund,” a White House Office of Management and Budget spokesperson said in a statement.
Mr. Biden will travel to Florida on Saturday to survey damage from Hurricane Idalia, which was later downgraded to a tropical storm.
On Thursday, Mr. Biden visited FEMA headquarters to meet with staff and had pizzas delivered for them. During his visit, he urged Congress to quickly approve the disaster relief funds.
“Some of .. my former colleagues in the Senate… think that this disaster relief money we’re asking [for] to continue to finish the job so far, and have enough money to continue to work to save the American people—their lives, their homes, their well-being—is somehow not needed,” Mr. Biden said.
“We need this disaster relief [to be] met, and we need to do it in September, it can’t wait,” he said.
• Jeff Mordock can be reached at jmordock@washingtontimes.com.
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