The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) has come under fire for its response to Hurricane Helene in North Carolina with widespread reports of the agency failing to aid people in affected areas.

Against that backdrop, in a clip posted on the X account of End Wokeness, various officials discuss disaster preparedness as part of FEMA’s mission and focus, in part, on LGBTQIA issues. LGBTQIA stands for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer or Questioning, Intersex, Asexual.

In the clip, taken from a Zoom call, one FEMA official stated, “LGBTQIA people and people who have been disadvantaged already are struggling. They already have their own things to deal with. So you add a disaster on top of that, it’s just compounding on itself.”

Another participant said the culture of emergency management is shifting “from utilitarian principles where everything is designed for the greatest good to the greatest amount of people to disaster equity,” and suggested policies should be changed to give greater benefit to “communities that have pre-existing vulnerabilities in accessing disaster-related recovery supports.”

FEMA has been heavily criticized for perceived failings in its response to the hurricane-related disaster in Georgia and North Carolina, in particular, and for the agency’s general management.

Alejandro N. Mayorkas, the federal homeland security secretary, recently claimed the agency does not have enough funding to cover anticipated disaster-response expenses for the remainder of the hurricane season.

In response, critics noted the agency has spent more than $1 billion for a program that benefits illegal immigrants over the past two fiscal years and argued that money would have been better spent on disaster relief.

U.S. Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., during a recent appearance on “Meet the Press,” criticized the Biden-Harris administration, saying the administration “has no problem finding money when they want to spend it on their priorities” but not on core functions.

“When they need hundreds of billions of dollars to pay off student loans for graduate students and gender studies programs, they somehow find it,” Cotton said. “When it’s trying to get helicopters to deliver food and water and cellular service and life-saving medicine into these mountain valleys, they somehow can’t seem to find the money.”

Photo Credit: Bill McMannis, via Wikimedia Commons