Shitstain Blocked Emergency Federal Aid To WA For Months After Wildfire Disaster Because He Was Mad At Gov. Jay Inslee

In early September 2020, wildfires tore through eastern Washington state, obliterating tens of millions of dollars of property, displacing hundreds of rural residents and killing a 1-year-old boy. But then-President Donald Trump refused to act on Gov. Jay Inslee’s request for $37 million in federal disaster aid because of a bitter personal dispute with the Democratic governor, an investigation by POLITICO’s E&E News shows. Trump sat on Inslee’s request for the final four months of his presidency, delaying recovery and leaving communities unsure about rebuilding because nobody knew if they would get federal help. Trump ignored Inslee’s 73-page request even after the Federal Emergency Management Agency found during weeks of inspection that the wildfires easily met the federal damage threshold for disaster aid.

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The two men had been feuding in the months leading up to the wildfire with Trump calling Inslee “a snake,” a “nasty person” and a “failed presidential candidate” after the governor criticized the administration’s handling of the coronavirus pandemic. And Inslee, in an open letter two days before seeking disaster aid, assailed Trump’s “reckless statements” on climate change and his “gutting of environmental policies.” Trump’s spurning of Washington — documented by internal emails, letters, federal records and interviews — is the latest example of how the former president used disaster requests to punish political foes. E&E News reported in early October that Trump had refused to give disaster aid to California after wildfires in 2018 because the state is strongly Democratic.

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Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, a Republican representing the wildfire-damaged area in Washington state, asked Trump at least twice to approve disaster aid and wrote him a desperate letter on Dec. 31, 2020, obtained by E&E News. “People in my district need support, and I implore you to move forward in providing it to those who have been impacted by devastating wildfires,” McMorris Rodgers wrote. Her district was one of three in Washington state to support Trump in the 2020 election. Washington has 10 congressional districts. Five months after Trump left office, McMorris Rodgers introduced a bill to require presidents to act on governors’ requests for disaster aid within 30 days. She did not respond to a request for comment.

President Joe Biden ultimately approved Inslee’s request two weeks after taking office — 141 days after Inslee had made it — and has given Washington $45 million. The time span — nearly five months — is the longest it’s taken a president to approve a disaster request, according to an E&E News analysis of more than 1,000 FEMA damage reports since 2007 when they first became publicly available. The average time period for presidential approval is 17 days.

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https://www.eenews.net/articles/trump-ignored-disaster-aid-request-from-political-rival/