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$10 Million From FEMA Diverted to Pay for Immigration Detention Centers, Document Shows

The Department of Homeland Security denied that any money transferred came from the Federal Emergency Management Agency’s disasters relief accounts, which pay for work related to hurricanes and other natural disasters.Credit...Carlos Giusti/Associated Press

WASHINGTON — The Department of Homeland Security transferred nearly $10 million from the Federal Emergency Management Agency to Immigration and Customs Enforcement, according to a budget document released by a Democratic senator late Tuesday night, diverting funds from the relief agency at the start of the hurricane season that began in June. The release of the document comes as a major storm barrels toward the East Coast.

The document, which was released by the office of Senator Jeff Merkley, of Oregon, shows that the money would come from FEMA’s operations and support budget and was transferred into accounts at ICE to pay for detention and removal operations. The document also shows that the Department of Homeland Security transferred money from accounts at Customs and Border Protection that pays for border fencing and technology.

The transfer was a part of more than $200 million the Department of Homeland Security moved from the budgets of other agencies to ICE’s detention and removals.

Mr. Merkley, appearing Tuesday night on “The Rachel Maddow Show” on MSNBC, said the Trump administration was taking money from FEMA’S “response and recovery” and “working hard to find funds for additional detention camps.” Mr. Merkley has been a vocal critic of the administration’s immigration policies.

The Department of Homeland Security denies that any money transferred came from FEMA’s disasters relief accounts, which pay for work related to hurricanes and other natural disasters.

“Under no circumstances was any disaster relief funding transferred from @fema to immigration enforcement efforts,” Tyler Q. Houlton, an agency spokesman, said on Twitter. “This is a sorry attempt to push a false agenda at a time when the administration is focused on assisting millions on the East Coast facing a catastrophic disaster.”

Mr. Houlton added that money transferred from FEMA could not have been used to pay for hurricane relief efforts because of “appropriation limitations.”

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Senator Jeff Merkley, Democrat of Oregon, accused the Trump administration of taking money from FEMA’S “response and recovery” and “working hard to find funds for additional detention camps.”Credit...Erin Schaff for The New York Times

“DHS/FEMA stand fiscally and operationally ready to support current and future response and recovery needs,” he said.

In an email, the agency said funds taken from FEMA’s accounts amounted to less than one percent of the agency’s operational accounts and was taken from money to pay for employee travel expenses, training, basic purchase cards and office supplies, among other things. FEMA’s funding for disaster response is in a separate, $25 billion account, the agency said.

The agency said it is prepared for Hurricane Florence, which is expected to hit North and South Carolina, and Virginia on Thursday or Friday. FEMA officials said the hurricane could be the strongest storm to hit the Carolinas and Virginia region “in decades.”

The release of the budget documents showing the money transfers between FEMA and ICE came after President Trump in an interview called last year’s hurricane response efforts by FEMA in Puerto Rico an “unsung success”

“The job that FEMA and law enforcement and everybody did working along with the governor in Puerto Rico, I think was tremendous,” Mr. Trump said.

In an early Wednesday morning Twitter post, Mr. Trump doubled down on the agency’s performance: “We got A Pluses for our recent hurricane work in Texas and Florida (and did an unappreciated great job in Puerto Rico, even though an inaccessible island with very poor electricity and a totally incompetent Mayor of San Juan). We are ready for the big one that is coming!”

New data shows that nearly 3,000 people died as a result of the hurricane and many people continue to live without power on the island. An after-action report by FEMA released in July shows that they agency vastly underestimated how much food and fresh water it would need, and how hard it would be to get additional supplies to the island.

The report describes the initial response as chaotic and disorganized and plagued with logistical problems as the agency tried to get food and other equipment onto the island.

A correction was made on 
Sept. 12, 2018

An earlier version of this article misstated when a budget document was released by a senator. Senator Jeff Merkley released a budget document late Tuesday, not Wednesday.

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A version of this article appears in print on  , Section A, Page 19 of the New York edition with the headline: FEMA Funds Used to Pay For Detention of Migrants. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe

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