00:00The chair now recognizes the ranking member, Mr. Stanton, for five minutes in his opening statement.
00:06Mr. Chairman, before I begin my testimony, I ask for unanimous consent that the committee observe a moment of silence
00:13to honor the 135 lives lost in the Texas floods and to pray for the safe return of those still missing.
00:22Without objection, so ordered.
00:30Thank you, Mr. Chairman. For the sake of time, I ask unanimous consent to submit for the record news accounts corroborating the details I'm about to provide in my opening statement.
00:41Mr. Chairman, thank you for holding this hearing and focusing our mission to the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
00:50Every Democrat on this panel accepts that challenge, and I hope we can work together in a bipartisan way to get this done.
00:56The news out of Texas is heartbreaking.
01:00On July 4th, flash floods swept through Kerrville and nearby communities, claiming 135 lives, including 37 children.
01:10We have learned the faces and stories of the victims, young girls whose dreams were stolen,
01:18camp staff who gave their lives leading children to safety,
01:21a father who punched through the window to save his family before bleeding to death from his injuries.
01:30And two little sisters swept away together, later found holding hands.
01:38So many grieving neighbors and families on the ground who have been working around the clock in response to this disaster.
01:45To those brave women and men, we see you, we thank you, and we will not forget your heroism.
01:54Meanwhile, the acting female administrator, David Richardson, before us today was missing in action.
01:59For the first 48 hours, the most critical window for search and rescue, he never visited the National Response Coordination Center.
02:06For more than a week, he stayed away from Texas.
02:08And for 10 days, he made no statement about the tragedy, not a word of sympathy or reassurance to the public.
02:16When he appeared finally in Texas on July 12th, it felt like a box-checking exercise to quiet his critics.
02:24He stayed only a few hours.
02:26But in his rush, Mr. Richardson failed to check the most important box, basic human decency.
02:32This tragedy forces some incredibly hard questions.
02:36Did the FEMA administrator fulfill his legal duty?
02:38Did he fulfill his moral duty?
02:40Did the administrator sitting before us do everything that he could to save lives?
02:45The FEMA administrator is the primary federal coordinator for disaster response.
02:49That means anticipating these, acting proactively, moving resources swiftly, even without waiting for a specific state request.
02:58FEMA's own national response framework demands proactive search and rescue.
03:02These reforms were put into place after Hurricane Katrina when federal failures cost lives.
03:08Yet, nearly 20 years later, history has tragically repeated itself.
03:13Secretary Noem required her personal sign-off on every contract above $100,000.
03:19That bottleneck delayed urban search and rescue teams for more than 72 hours.
03:25By the time many urban search and rescue teams reached Texas, no one had been found alive for days.
03:31Days.
03:32On July 5th, less than 24 hours after the tragedy, FEMA's call center contract expired because of this $100,000 sign-off policy.
03:41The result?
03:43The vast majority of calls from survivors went unanswered.
03:46Families desperate for shelter and aid were met with silence.
03:51Can you imagine losing a family member, losing your home, and having your call go unanswered when you're looking for a lifeline?
03:59Yet, on July 11th, with over 100 people still missing and search teams still working to find people, President Trump and Secretary Noem called it, quote, the best FEMA response ever, unquote.
04:12All while this administration was working to dismantle FEMA, the very agency whose workers were still risking their lives to save others.
04:21According to CNN, FEMA search and rescue chief resigned in frustration over the Texas response.
04:27DHS bureaucratic hurdles cost his team critical time and likely lives.
04:32This committee has a duty to uncover why FEMA failed to meet its obligations and ensure no community ever faces these failures again.
04:40So I look forward to the question, Mr. Richardson, about these stunning breakdowns in leadership and how we fix them.
04:46Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
04:47I yield back.
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