WASHINGTON (AP) — Cameron Hamilton, President Donald Trump’s nominee to lead the Federal Emergency Management Agency, pledged to senators Wednesday to be “fair and reasonable” in assessing requests for disaster aid as he seeks to run an agency roiled by the administration’s threats to dismantle it.
Hamilton appeared before the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee at a hearing where lawmakers assessed a group of 10 nominees for administration posts.
“My focus will be to ensure that FEMA is objective, is fair and reasonable, follows the law, and is consistent” in how it reviews disaster declaration requests, Hamilton told Michigan Sen. Gary Peters, the top Democrat on the committee. Peters had asked about partisanship in granting major disaster declarations.
Hamilton had a brief tenure as FEMA’s temporary leader early last year but was ousted after defending the agency’s existence. At a House hearing in May 2025, he said he did not “believe it is in the best interest of the American people to eliminate” FEMA. He was fired the next day.
The hearing comes as the agency faces ongoing uncertainty. MSI previously reported that Trump nominated Hamilton to lead FEMA in May 2026, roughly a year after firing him for that same testimony. The administration has also pursued staff reductions at the agency and has at times delayed or denied disaster aid requests from states, drawing scrutiny from lawmakers in both parties.
Hamilton’s nomination now moves to the full Senate for a confirmation vote.