WASHINGTON — Members of the House Judiciary Committee used an oversight hearing Wednesday to challenge Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem over delays in dispersing Federal Emergency Management Agency funds, as well as the Trump administration’s plans to overhaul the disaster relief agency.

The questions focused on Noem’s policy requiring her to sign off personally on expenditures of more than $100,000, at a hearing that otherwise focused largely on her role in the Trump administration’s aggressive immigration enforcement approach.

Rep. Kevin Kiley, R-Calif., pointed to a request for a $2.5 million grant for a locality in his district intended for hazard mitigation in a rural, fire-prone region that he said suffered in one of the state’s worst wildfires. He told Noem the grant went through all the necessary approvals, and yet, “since June of last year, it’s just been waiting for your signature.”

Kiley said he reached out in December 2025 about funds that were set to expire but he didn’t hear back, so the had to rely on an extension from the state. Kiley said he sought a meeting with Noem.

“Our office has heard nothing,” Kiley said. “We’ve gotten no updates in front of the Department of Homeland Security. We’ve been in constant contact every week.”

Noem responded she wasn’t immediately aware of the grant and said it would be held up at FEMA and not with her office, but she would look into it. Noem said her policy is to review contracts valued at $100,000, but grants are not part of that.

“I do have a requirement on reviewing contracts because I find incredible fraud and inefficiencies and theft for American taxpayers in government contracting, but grants, I do not,” Noem said.

Noem also defended the speed DHS has allocated funds and pointed to the high demand for disaster relief since President Donald Trump started his second term last year, with 16 disaster declarations and 41 major disasters.

“FEMA is dispersing funds on grants and relief and public assistance and individual assistance twice as fast as it ever has in its history,” Noem said.

Rep. Deborah K. Ross, D-N.C., was fiery in her objections and said Noem’s $100,000 policy “has contributed to many of these delays, creating a bottleneck, blocking reimbursement for hundreds of millions of dollars of disaster funding.”

“North Carolina’s counties have had to step up to fill in the gap, spending their limited taxpayer funds on recovering and repair with the expectation that they would swiftly be reimbursed by the federal government, and yet, many of these counties have not been reimbursed until this week,” Ross said.

Ross said $80 million in relief aid didn’t flow until today, the day after Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., criticized Noem at a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, in part for her management of FEMA.

Noem said North Carolina received billions more in funding under Trump than the state did under former President Joe Biden. Ross responded that Biden “provided great relief” and “showed up,” and the reason more money came later was because Congress appropriated it.

“You have been too slow,” Ross said. “I have heard this from Republican county commissioners. I have heard this from administrators. I have been in the western part of the state. I know exactly what’s going on, and you have turned a blind eye while you’re busy trying to deport American citizens.”

The questioning at the House panel comes on the same day Democrats on the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee — Gary Peters of Michigan and Andy Kim of New Jersey — issued a report that found Noem’s policy issued in June has caused delays.

The report tracked approvals from June to September of last year, and found the directive “delayed approval or left approval pending for 1,034 contracts, grants, or disaster assistance awards” as of September 2025, including 29 instances of FEMA spending requests exceeding $100,000 that were delayed or still awaiting approval at that time.

“Rather than meeting the Administration’s stated goal of addressing waste, the Secretary’s policy has caused delays and hardship for communities needing prompt assistance, in addition to violating federal law,” the report says.

FEMA council

Noem also faced criticism for her approach to FEMA, particularly in her role as co-chair of a FEMA Review Council that President Donald Trump formed to advise about the future of the agency.

Trump has called for the dismantling of FEMA in favor of a system that would deliver funding for disaster relief directly to the states. The president also cited political bias in responses to disasters and spending funds on undocumented immigrants.

The FEMA Review Council, however, appears to have reached a conclusion that stopped short of that vision. The council report hasn’t been released, after a meeting to approve the report was canceled abruptly amid concerns from White House officials they had not been briefed on it.

Rep. Jared Moskowitz, D-Fla., presented a document before the committee he said was the draft version of the FEMA report he obtained. The original draft report was 122 pages, and Noem cut it to 23 pages, Moskowitz said.

“This report’s never been seen public before, OK, but this is it,” Moskowitz said. “You cut out all the stuff that was put in by governors who have been through disasters, emergency management directors, FEMA experts, national security members. You cut it all out.”

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