Overview

• Rescuers have recovered over 120 bodies and continue searching for more than 160 people still unaccounted for in Kerr County.
• New FEMA spending thresholds requiring personal sign-off from Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem reportedly held up deployment of federal teams for up to 72 hours.
• Kerr County officials are under fire for rejecting a decade-old proposal to install flood-warning sirens after failing to secure roughly $1 million in funding.
• Noem has called for dismantling FEMA as overly bureaucratic, echoing President Trump’s pledge to transfer disaster-response duties to state authorities.
• Sheriff Larry Leitha has launched a full investigation into why residents received no timely warnings before the flash flood struck.