Since taking office, President Trump has called for the elimination of the Federal Emergency Management Agency or FEMA, suggesting it could be dismantled as soon as December.

Lately, his team has backed away from that idea, but there are still major changes underway and serious concerns that FEMA's response is at times politicized.

Stephanie Sy is back with our look at the changes so far and what it

could mean for disaster preparedness. President Trump has signaled in the past that major

changes would be coming to FEMA after this hurricane season. But last month, he had praise for

FEMA's work after the deadly July 4th flooding in Texas, saying his administration had, quote,

fixed it up in no time. Even so, the Trump administration is attempting to reallocate some $4 billion

in funds meant to help local communities protect against natural disasters, a move of federal

judge blocked this week.

So what has the turmoil at FEMA meant for people affected by natural disasters?

Sarah Labowitz, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, has been

looking into just that. Sarah, thanks for joining us.

So I understand you and your team track how much federal

spending is going to disaster recovery. What does the data tell us about disaster response under

this Trump administration? And what stands out to you when compared to previous administrations?

Well, one thing that's really standing out to me

is how long it's taking to approve disaster declaration requests. When a disaster hits,

a governor typically makes a request to the federal government for help. And what we're seeing

is that those requests are really stacking up so that FEMA help is getting to places much

slower than it was under the previous administration and even under the first President

Trump administration. The other thing that we're seeing is that the administration is no longer

approving requests for mitigation funding. And that's the funding that jurisdictions use to

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