Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody has filed a lawsuit alleging that the Federal Emergency Management Agency violated the civil rights of supporters of President-elect Donald Trump in the aftermath of hurricanes Helene and Milton.
Moody filed the lawsuit Wednesday in federal court in Fort Pierce, after reports that a FEMA supervisor directed aid workers to avoid going to homes in Lake Placid that had yard signs supporting Trump.
FEMA Administrator Deanne Criswell issued a statement last week that said the supervisor had been fired, calling the direction to avoid homes with Trump yard signs “reprehensible.”
But Moody’s lawsuit, which names as defendants Criswell and the fired supervisor, Marn’i Washington, alleges that a conspiracy existed that violated the rights of Trump supporters. Citing a story in the Washington Examiner, the lawsuit quotes Washington as saying she was a “patsy” and was made a “scapegoat” by FEMA.
“While the facts will continue to come out over the weeks and months, it is already clear that defendant Washington conspired with senior FEMA officials, as well as those carrying out her orders, to violate the civil rights of Florida citizens,” the lawsuit said.
The lawsuit seeks damages and a declaration that the defendants “conspired to interfere with the civil rights of Trump supporters in Florida” in violation of a federal law.
In the statement last week, Criswell said agency employees “adhere to FEMA’s core values and are dedicated to helping people before, during and after disasters, often sacrificing time with their own families to help disaster survivors.”
“Recently, one FEMA employee departed from these values to advise her survivor assistance team to not go to homes with yard signs supporting President-elect Trump,” the statement said. “This is a clear violation of FEMA’s core values and principles to help people regardless of their political affiliation. This was reprehensible. I want to be clear to all of my employees and the American people, this type of behavior and action will not be tolerated at FEMA and we will hold people accountable if they violate these standards of conduct.”
The Washington Examiner story cited in the lawsuit included an interview with Washington, who said she and other workers went to homes with Trump signs and provided resources. She indicated some streets were avoided for safety reasons.
Washington said she “let her supervisors ‘know specific streets we could not do because of hostile political encounters,’ and according to communications obtained by the Washington Examiner, she was encouraged and supported in her decision to avoid certain streets ‘to keep the team safe,’” according to the story.
In addition to Moody’s lawsuit, U.S. Rep. Vern Buchanan, R-Fla., on Thursday led a letter co-signed by 54 U.S. House members that posed a series of questions to Criswell. The letter said workers skipped at least 20 homes with Trump signs or flags, preventing residents from getting FEMA assistance.
“Such blatant discrimination is a severe breach of FEMA’s duty to serve all Americans impartially, especially in times of disaster when people’s lives and livelihoods are at stake,” the letter said. “It is alarming and unacceptable that a federal agency would exhibit such blatant and politically charged bias, disregarding residents based on their political beliefs.”
