FEMA To Fire Employees Over 'Egregious' NYC Hotel Payments, But $59 Million Claim Lacks Confirmation
by: Ed Payne
Did the Federal Emergency Management Agency fraudulently send $59 million to luxury hotels in New York City to "house illegal migrants"? It's complicated: A New York City Hall spokesperson told Lead Stories that New York "never paid luxury-hotel rates" and that about a third of the $59 million -- around $19 million -- covered "direct hotel costs." A Department of Homeland Security statement said FEMA is firing four employees who made "egregious payments for luxury NYC hotels for migrants," but the agency wouldn't confirm the amount.
The claim appeared in a post published on X by Elon Musk on February 10, 2025. The post's caption said:
The @dogE team just discovered that FEMA sent $59M LAST WEEK to luxury hotels in New York City to house illegal migrants.
Sending this money violated the law and is in gross insubordination to the President's executive order.
That money is meant for American disaster relief and instead is being spent on high end hotels for illegals!
A clawback demand will be made today to recoup those funds.
This is what the post looked like on X at the time of writing:
The post does not provide any evidence to support its assertion that the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) fraudulently sent $59 million to luxury hotels in New York City to house undocumented immigrants.
Department of Homeland Security
A February 11, 2025, statement (archived here) from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), the parent agency of FEMA, did nothing to validate the $59 million figure. It said:
Effective immediately, FEMA is terminating the employment of four individuals for circumventing leadership to unilaterally make egregious payments for luxury NYC hotels for migrants. Firings include FEMA's Chief Financial Officer, two program analysts and a grant specialist.
Asked by Lead Stories in a February 11, 2025, email to confirm the amount of money and how it was spent, the DHS Office of Public Affairs said:
We have nothing more at this time.
New York City
In a February 11, 2025, email, a City Hall spokesperson told Lead Stories that New York City had paid out billions on the "international humanitarian crisis." Their statement continued:
We continue to see hundreds of migrants entering the city's care every week, with over 46,000 still in our shelter system and emergency-contracted hotels.
We have already spent over $7 billion on this crisis alone, and the previous administration committed only $237 million in funding to help house the migrants in our care and for future services. We have continued to receive previously allocated reimbursements through the past week. We will discuss this matter directly with federal officials.
City Hall disagreed with the numbers in Musk's social media post, saying New York never paid luxury hotel prices. It added that the city applied for the funds in April 2024, and FEMA approved them later that year. Out of the $59.3 million the city said it received from the agency, about $19 million went directly to hotel costs, $26 million covered services like food and security, and $13 million was used for group shelters and related services.
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