In a time of terrible natural disasters like the one Texas has just experienced, we rely on the Federal Emergency Management Agency to coordinate aid and help ensure local communities get the assistance they need.

We know that President Donald Trump and many voters have lost faith in the agency, and that Trump wants changes.

“FEMA’s a big disappointment,” he said at a January roundtable meeting with local officials at a Pacific Palisades fire station after wildfires ravaged parts of Los Angeles. “FEMA’s incompetently run.”

We don’t disagree that FEMA could use reform, but Trump’s rhetoric, once again, has only made it harder to separate the real problems from his political whims.

In 2018, during his previous term as president, he made public threats to withhold disaster aid to California after wildfires because the state leans Democratic. He made similar threats again earlier this year after wildfires tore through the Los Angeles area. And during last year’s campaign, Trump claimed that now-former President Joe Biden tried to limit aid to Republican areas in Southern states after Hurricane Helene. The GOP governors of Georgia, South Carolina and Virginia disputed his statement.

Trump has announced he wants to eliminate FEMA and replace it with block grants to states. Let states handle their own disasters, he said.

We couldn’t help but notice, however, that Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem appeared with state officials Saturday at a news briefing about the Central Texas floods. (FEMA, which has not had a permanent director since January, is part of Homeland Security.) President Trump quickly signed a disaster declaration.

Trump’s comments after the Texas flood stand in stark contrast to his statements about California. Treating federal disaster aid as a political football only exacerbates pain in times of turmoil. Only when that stops will Trump have the credibility to pursue what could be valuable reforms.

If nothing else, the president’s habit of politicizing federal aid makes a state block-grant system more attractive, as long as grants are allocated according to fair criteria. State and local leaders know their jurisdictions better than federal authorities, and a closer connection between decision-makers and voters could promote accountability. Texas has strong emergency management capabilities, so devolving more responsibility to the state might work here.

That said, any major shift in disaster aid deserves more careful thought and planning than the administration has devoted to it. For example, more rural and poorer states may have less capacity to prepare for emergencies; how would the block grant formula incorporate that information?

Also, what happens to the National Flood Insurance Program, which is managed by FEMA? Would the federal government rescind unexpended block grant money if no disaster strikes? Could states use the funds for mitigation, such as buying out property owners in flood-prone areas?

Block grants would not remove all possibility of corruption or political patronage. But when disaster recovery takes longer, and is more frustrating than expected, local and state officials will have no one but themselves to blame.

— The Dallas Morning News via TNS