Rep. Jared Moskowitz, D-Fla. is largely right that FEMA’s current backlog of pending disaster applications is substantial, experts said. An analysis found applications have been pending longer than at any other time during the last 37 years
The Federal Emergency Management Agency’s “backlog of unanswered disaster assistance applications has exploded to the largest in its history.”Rep. Jared Moskowitz, D-Fla., speaking as then-Florida's Director of Emergency Management during a news conference on April 4, 2021, in Palmetto, Fla.
As of Jan. 28, the Federal Emergency Management Agency had 18 disaster declaration applications awaiting President Donald Trump’s approval. Eleven are more than a month old and some date back to October 2025. Disaster management experts said the backlog is substantial and requests are pending longer than usual. An analysis by The Associated Press found that over the last 37 years, disaster declarations were typically approved in three weeks or less. Approvals help provide quick relief for people and communities following a disaster, paying for temporary living arrangements, home repairs and recovery efforts.dumped snow and ice on a large swath of the country, disrupted travel and killed more than 30 people, a Florida congressman warned that the Federal Emergency Management Agency is letting disaster assistance requests pile up. "As the only former Emergency Management Director in Congress, it is my responsibility to sound the alarm that FEMA is being dismantled by Secretary Kristi Noem," U.S. Rep. Jared Moskowitz, D-Fla., wrote FEMA’s backlog of unanswered disaster assistance applications has exploded to the largest in its historyTaken together, the current list of pending disaster applications, independent analyses and information from disaster management experts show that the backlog is larger than is typical, with applications awaiting approval for longer periods of time compared with the last several decades. FEMA declined to answer our questions. Moskowitz’ office also did not respond to our request for evidence supporting his statement.shows 18 pending disaster declaration requests. Eleven are more than a month old. The requests are typically submitted through FEMA regional offices before being sent to the president for final approval.by The Associated Press examined how the current backlog compares with the last 37 years — covering the majority of FEMA’s 47-year history. During the agency’s first decade, the disaster declaration approval process wasn’t fully implemented and large disasters were relatively few and far between. The AP’s analysis found that, on average, it took less than two weeks for a major disaster declaration to be granted by presidents throughout the 1990s and early 2000s. During the last decade, under presidents from both political parties, that rose to about three weeks. In Trump’s second term so far, approvals are taking more than a month, on average."President Trump provides a more thorough review of disaster declaration requests than any Administration has before him. Gone are the days of rubber stamping FEMA recommendations — that’s not a bug, that’s a feature," Jackson said. Former FEMA officials, including people who helped process these types of declarations, told PolitiFact the backlog of pending applications is substantial, and was longer than average The processing time is most important, said Elizabeth Zimmerman, a former FEMA administrator under President Barack Obama."A reasonable amount of time for approval should really be no more than two weeks." Zimmerman said that could change with the type of request and how much money applicants are seeking, but even considering those factors, the current process is slower than normal. There may be contributing factors that are out of Trump’s control. The process for assessing natural disasters has become more complex over time and Still, these delays mean people have to wait to receive federal aid for temporary housing and home repairs. It can also impede recovery efforts as local governments don’t know when or whether they will receive federal reimbursements."There's a lot of anecdotal information that things are being held up, and it’s adversely affecting these communities," said Michael Coen, a former FEMA chief of staff in the Obama and Biden administrations."I have heard from multiple FEMA employees who are frustrated over a lot of projects that are being held up by the secretary’s office."in September that many of FEMA’s core functions have ground to a halt under the Trump administration, and contracts and grants haven’t been approved because of new bureaucratic hurdles. "A wave of senior staff departed the agency when Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency offered buyouts, taking decades of experience with them,"Another 400 FEMA employees were routed to work at Immigration and Customs Enforcement as the administration started dismantling FEMA’s disaster-response infrastructure., FEMA said it withheld $10.9 billion in disaster payments to 45 states in the final months of fiscal year 2025, which ended Sept. 30.FEMA said it"shifted" the reimbursements to fiscal year 2026 but did not say when the money would be paid. In response toThe New York Times found ,"includes money that had already been approved by regional FEMA offices for things like debris removal, and repairs to roads, bridges and water and sewer systems."Moskowitz said FEMA’s backlog of unanswered disaster assistance applications"has exploded to the largest in its history." We were unable to quantify whether the current backlog is the largest in agency history; publicly available data is limited, and no public database provides historical comparisons.As of Jan. 28, FEMA listed 18 pending disaster declarations awaiting Trump’s approval. Eleven are more than a month old and some date back to October. Disaster management experts said the backlog is particularly large compared with what’s typical and that requests are sitting longer than normal. A September 2025 AP analysis found that over the last 37 years — which covers most of FEMA’s existence and the timeframe when it implemented its current assistance system — disaster declarations were typically approved in three weeks or less. Approvals are taking more than a month, on average, so far during Trump’s second term.Email interview, Craig Fugate, former FEMA administrator, Jan. 26, 2026The Federal Emergency Management Agency’s “backlog of unanswered disaster assistance applications has exploded to the largest in its history.” Venezuelan leader Nicolás Maduro “was releasing people from his prisons and sending them to our southern border under the Biden administration.” In Florida, “68 to 70% of property tax revenue” is from “second homes, investment properties, commercial properties, Airbnb,” not primary residences. On Jan. 6, 2021, 274 FBI agents were “probably acting as agitators and insurrectionists, but certainly not as ‘law enforcement officials.’”A book on Amazon titled “The Shooting of Charlie Kirk” with a Sept. 9 publication date is evidence the event was staged. The Federal Emergency Management Agency’s “backlog of unanswered disaster assistance applications has exploded to the largest in its history.” "Right now we're focused on Minneapolis because that's where we have the highest concentration of people who have violated our immigration laws."“You cannot bring a firearm loaded with multiple magazines to any sort of protest that you want. It’s that simple.” Protesters against the federal immigration crackdown in Minnesota are conducting “fake protests done by agitators and professional insurrectionists. …They're professional troublemakers.”
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