FEMA leader fired after breaking with Trump administration on eliminating agency

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FEMA leader fired after breaking with Trump administration on eliminating agency

The head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency was fired Thursday morning, three U.S. officials with direct knowledge confirmed to CBS News — after the leader appeared to publicly break with the Trump administration on whether to eliminate the nation’s disaster relief agency.  

Cameron Hamilton, FEMA’s acting administrator, departs the nation’s disaster relief agency roughly three weeks before the start of the Atlantic hurricane season and as Congress reviews the Trump administration’s

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to slash FEMA’s budget, nixing $646 million in non-disaster grants during the 2026 fiscal year.

Department of Homeland Security Senior Advisor Corey Lewandowski and Deputy Homeland Security Secretary Troy Edgar dismissed Cameron Hamilton during an in-person meeting at DHS headquarters, according to three sources with knowledge of the meeting. The firing came at the direction of DHS Secretary Kristi Noem, the sources said.

A FEMA spokesperson confirmed Hamilton “is no longer serving” as the agency’s leader. David Richardson, another DHS official who acted as Assistant Secretary for DHS’ Countering Weapons of Mass Destruction Office, will now head the agency in an acting capacity, the spokesperson said.

The dismissal came one day after Hamilton publicly testified that he did not support scrapping FEMA, as President Trump and members of his administration have suggested.

“I do not believe it is in the best interests of the American people to eliminate the Federal Emergency Management Agency,” Hamilton said at a House Appropriations subcommittee hearing on Capitol Hill, Wednesday. 

In a separate hearing a day earlier, DHS Secretary Kristi Noem told the same committee that Mr. Trump believes “FEMA, as it exists today, should be eliminated — empowering states to respond to disasters with federal government support.”

Mr. Trump said days after taking office he planned to “begin the process of fundamentally reforming and overhauling FEMA, or maybe getting rid of FEMA,” criticizing the agency for allegedly responding slowly to natural disasters. 

The president later

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of FEMA, tasking Noem and other administration officials with assessing the agency’s performance and considering “whether FEMA can serve its functions as a support agency, providing supplemental Federal assistance, to the States rather than supplanting State control of disaster relief.”

Michael Kaplan

contributed to this report.

Nicole Sganga

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Nicole Sganga is CBS News’ homeland security and justice correspondent. She is based in Washington, D.C. and reports for all shows and platforms.

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