The weekend’s fatal floods in Texas have sparked immediate clashes in Congress over the federal role in preventing, or at least minimizing, the human toll of natural disasters.
On one side are Democrats pointing to the Trump administration’s cuts to the National Weather Service (NWS) as a potential reason the flood victims were not better forewarned. They’re calling for investigations into why the alert systems in place were not more effective.
On the other side are Trump’s GOP allies, who argue that the president’s efforts to slash federal agencies, including the NWS, were a non-factor in what they say was simply a freak natural calamity. They’re accusing the Democrats of exploiting a natural disaster for their own political gain.
The partisan dispute could hamper what is likely to be the coming debate over Congress’s emergency response to the severe flooding in the Hill Country of Central Texas, where at least 90 people — including girls attending a summer camp — were killed as the waters of the Guadalupe River rose violently in the earliest hours of July 4.
The massive flooding has put the GOP on the back foot as lawmakers try to defend the federal response and actions by the administration after roughly one-sixth of the weather service’s workforce has been culled over the past six months. The cuts were part of Trump’s strategy to use the so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) — an extension of the White House initially led by the billionaire Elon Musk — as a vehicle to shrink the federal government.
Trump’s allies said the failure occurred within the regional, not the federal, ranks.
“The challenge was at a local level,” Sen. Ted Budd (R-N.C.) told reporters at the Capitol on Monday, noting that “some sort of wide-ranging notification should have been possible.”
“That didn’t happen. That’s not anything from the national level, but I think we need to take a look at how to prevent this. It was just a bad situation all around,” said Budd, who has dealt with the recovery of Western North Carolina after Hurricane Helene for most of the past year. “This was a horrible storm. … This was an act of nature.”
Some Democrats, for their part, are highlighting the cuts to the NWS as a potential reason that warnings from weather experts and local authorities did not reach the victims in time to compel an evacuation.
“I’m personally praying that Donald Trump finally understands this is not a game — it’s real life and there are serious consequences to playing politics with our security and emergency preparedness,” Ken Martin, the chairman of the Democratic National Committee, said in a statement.
“He was warned this could happen, he was told in clear terms that his weather service cuts could lead to needless deaths, and he didn’t care,” Martin continued. “As Donald Trump continues to ignore experts and gut our critical safety services, he is putting Americans everywhere in danger.”
Rep. Joaquin Castro (D-Texas), who represents nearby San Antonio, raised similar questions. Responding to reports that several Texas offices of the NWS had vacancies resulting from Trump’s DOGE purge, Castro said there needs to be an investigation into whether those cuts were a factor.
“On most days, obviously, you’re not going to have a tragedy like this, but when you have flash flooding, there’s a risk that you won’t have the personnel to … do that analysis, do the predictions in the best way. And it could lead to tragedy,” he said in an interview on CNN’s “State of the Union” program.
“I don’t want to sit here and say conclusively that that was the case, but I do think that it should be investigated.”
Rep. Becca Balint (D), a Vermont liberal, was more forceful.
“We knew that these cuts would have deadly consequences,” she posted on X. “The NWS budget isn’t just a number that can be slashed because Trump and DOGE feel like it. These are real services that would have saved real people.”
Amid the finger pointing, the Weather Service issued a statement on Monday dismissing the idea that understaffing in Texas offices might have contributed to the tragedy. Rather, the agency said it had additional forecasters in those regional offices in anticipation of heavy rains in the area, and that “all forecasts and warnings were issued in a timely manner.”
“Additionally, these offices were able to provide decision support services to local partners, including those in the emergency management community,” the agency said.
That has not prevented some local officials from accusing the NWS of giving what they consider misleading forecasts about the severity of the rain and the subsequent flooding.
“Everybody got the forecast from the National Weather Service,” said Texas Division of Emergency Management Chief Nim Kidd. “It did not predict the amount of rain that we saw.”
What can be done on the congressional side remains an unanswered question, and one that might take some time to become clear. Congress has typically responded to severe natural disasters — hurricanes, wildfires, floods — with emergency funding to help affected communities weather the damage and rebuild. But even that once-routine process has been hamstrung by the partisan polarization that practically defines contemporary politics.
Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) said on Sunday that he feels “helpless” for now until supplemental requests roll in from lawmakers in the area and a greater assessment of the damage is conducted.
“Every available resource has been deployed. The president, of course, is dialed in and watching this develop moment by moment, as we are,” he told Fox News. “We will handle supplemental funding requests as they come in, but right now they’re still trying to do rescue and recovery, and our hearts go out to all of them.”
An outstanding question is whether any new emergency funding would have to be offset with changes elsewhere in the budget, or would be conditioned on separate policy reforms, as some Republicans have demanded of California wildfire aid. Those demands have delayed the delivery of emergency aid — and infuriated Democrats, who have accused Republicans of favoring red states over blue ones.
“Republicans spent months threatening to condition disaster assistance to devastated communities. That behavior was disgraceful,” House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) posted Monday on X. “Our job is to help everyone in need.”
At this point, lawmakers seem open to a supplemental funding package, though they admit it will take time to figure out a dollar amount.
“We want to take a look at it, but anything we can do to help,” Budd said, noting the December government funding bill included $100 billion for the state’s recovery efforts. “We want to, certainly, be open to that.
“But let’s get through the immediate stage right now, take care of lives, save as many lives as possible, assess the damage and then come with an accurate request of what’s needed,” he continued. “There’s enough emotion involved on this. Let’s wait until we actually know, then let’s take care of the people first.”
Politics almost always play a role in disaster recovery.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) on Monday called on the inspector general at the Commerce Department to probe the vacancies at NWS to determine whether they played a role in the rising death toll.
But lawmakers also appeared unified in arguing that whatever is to blame, there has to be a remedy to what happened.
“Look, the fact that you have girls asleep in their cabins when the floodwaters are rising — something went wrong there,” Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) said on Monday. “We’ve got to fix that and have a better system of warning to get kids out of harm’s way.”
