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Not My Neighbor: The Gospel According to Trump [1]

['This Content Is Not Subject To Review Daily Kos Staff Prior To Publication.']

Date: 2025-05-28

FEMA—WWJD? Jesus’s parables often turned conventional thinking on its head. One of the most radical was “The Good Samaritan”—the “go and do likewise” parable. Its power lies in the call to recognize that everyone is your neighbor—if you can set aside what separates, divides, or enrages.

And what do we owe our neighbor in need? An open hand, not a clenched fist, but Trump is all fist—no compassion. He calls it “America First,” but it’s a resentful, angry, selfishAmerica—unrecognizable to the world and even to itself.

And what is Trump trying to do? He is destroying the Good Samaritans of government. Like USAID, which Trump and Musk obliterated—America Gone. Like AmeriCorps, which has suffered a 40% budget decrease, with 1,000 programs closed—America Last. Like the U.S. Institute of Peace, which Trump shuttered—America Impotent.

The Peace Corps survives—for now. Project 2025 even proposes expanding it to counter Russian and Chinese influence abroad. But what communities would welcome American volunteers from a country increasingly isolated, discredited, and at odds with itself? America Incomprehensible.

Now FEMA—another Good Samaritan—is on the chopping block. Why? Because climate change is a “Chinese hoax,” as Trump once claimed. Guided by Project 2025, he’s moving to eliminate or drastically weaken FEMA, shifting disaster response to already overwhelmed state and local governments.

Trump announced his intention on January 24, 2025, when he visited Asheville, NC, to assess the aftermath of Hurricane Helene, which ravaged the state in late September 2024. Trump said, “I’d like to see the states take care of disasters. Let the state take care of the tornadoes and the hurricanes and all of the other things that happen.” That same day, Trump issued an Executive Order to create a Council to assess the Federal Emergency Management Agency. These are not reforms. They are the first steps in dismantling FEMA.

On March 19, 2025, his Executive Order, “Achieving Efficiency Through State and Local Preparedness,” was the next step. Historically, FEMA has covered 75% of the cost of public infrastructure repair, which can increase to 90% in major disasters. There is some help for homeowners, but it is limited. Losing this support amid escalating climate catastrophes would be devastating.

The metric for this has been the increase in billion-dollar weather events, measured by the amount of destruction caused. In 2023, there were 28 weather events worth over a billion dollars, which dropped to 27 in 2024. (Source: https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/access/billions/time-series) The overall trend is upward. Both years resulted in significant devastation and a substantial workload for FEMA.

But the climate-denying right found something to celebrate. On May 8, 2025, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) announced the retirement of its “billion-dollar weather and climate disasters” database—cutting off a vital source of data. Trump, who once used a black Sharpie to suggest falsely that Hurricane Dorian would strike Alabama, seems to believe that if we don’t collect the data, the crisis will disappear. If reality is inconvenient, delete it. If the weather is problematic, delete NOAA.

And yet, ironically, red states—those most loyal to Trump—have received more FEMA aid than blue or swing states. (Source:https://www.usnews.com/news/politics/articles/2025-02-03/who-gets-more-disaster-aid-republican-states-experts-explain-that-and-more-about-fema) The dismantling of FEMA will hit his MAGA base hardest.

Does Trump’s grudge against FEMA goes back to his awkward, tone-deaf paper towel roll toss during his 2017 visit to Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria? Was that the moment he decided to dismantle what made him look weak and foolish? Is this personal vengeance masquerading as policy?

This pivot to “states’ rights” comes at a cost. It’s not just FEMA. States, including poorer red states, will also shoulder greater responsibility in other domains—think Medicaid. Property insurance companies, meanwhile, are buckling under climate-related losses, raising premiums, or fleeing markets altogether.

So, what happens when a weakened federal government, stripped of its connective power, no longer binds the states in collective support? When states are left alone to face storms, fires, floods, and pandemics—alone and unprepared? Make America what?

What happens is this: we stop being neighbors. We stop being a nation. Jesus said, “Go and do likewise,” but Trump said, “Go it alone.” In the story of the Good Samaritan, it wasn’t religious piety or political loyalty that mattered—it was mercy. Without that shared moral core, “America First” becomes America fragmented, divided, and abandoned. The real question is no longer what we owe our neighbor—but whether we even remember who our neighbor is.

Day 129: days left to January 20, 2029: 1,333 days

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[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2025/5/28/2324721/-Not-My-Neighbor-The-Gospel-According-to-Trump?pm_campaign=front_page&pm_source=more_community&pm_medium=web

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