Hurricane Isaias is approaching the Gulf coast and is expected to make landfall late Friday or early Saturday, prompting states of emergency in Florida, Georgia and Alabama. But the storm could also become the first major test of Fema's ability to respond with reduced staffing after the Trump administration's efforts to downsize the agency, according to emergency management experts.
More than 4,300 employees left Fema in fiscal year 2025, about 17% of the workforce, the Government Accountability Office reported. The departures were not conducted systematically to ensure the agency could still meet its statutory obligations, said Chris Currie, director of homeland security and justice at the GAO.
"It's not whether Fema is going to respond. They're going to respond. It's more about the depth," Currie said.
Many of those who left took early retirement, meaning the agency lost experienced personnel. From January 2025 to January 2026, 58 senior executive service employees left Fema. In the prior three fiscal years, the agency reported about 13 such separations per year on average.
Among the top officials who left was the region four administrator, who oversees eight states including Florida and Alabama, where the storm is expected to hit.
Deanne Criswell, who led Fema under the Biden administration, said the loss of institutional knowledge was a greater concern than the raw number of departures.
"My biggest concerns are always the loss of institutional knowledge. You lose that knowledge. You lose the people who had been through these big disasters in the past," Criswell said.
In a written statement, Fema said it is actively monitoring and preparing for the hurricane. "Under President Trump and Secretary Mullin's leadership, the safety of the American people is DHS's top priority," the agency said. "Fema incident management assistance teams are deploying to Alabama and Florida, and Fema personnel are embedded in state emergency operations centers. Fema is also prepositioning emergency supplies at Maxwell air force base in Montgomery, Alabama, to supplement state resources if requested."
Governors of Florida, Georgia and Alabama have declared states of emergency. State emergency management officials in Louisiana and Mississippi said they have been in regular contact with Fema and received full support during Tropical Storm Arthur earlier this year.
At a news conference on Thursday, Jared Perdue, the Florida division of emergency management executive director, said the state has had very close coordination with federal partners at Fema.
Currie warned that the agency could quickly be stretched thin if it has to respond to more than one natural disaster, a possibility that could become consequential as El Niño strengthens and the agency heads into fall and winter.