Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer hopes to politicize Mother Nature. He has asked the Commerce Department to investigate whether staffing cuts at the National Weather Service offices in Texas contributed to the flood deaths that killed more than 100 people this past weekend.
“To honor the lives of those lost, we have a responsibility to the American people to determine whether preventable failures contributed to this tragedy,” the New York Democrat wrote to acting Commerce Department Inspector General Duane Townsend.
Senator Schumer is looking in the wrong place. Preventable failures almost certainly contributed to the tragedy in Kerrville, situated in what some Texans call “flash flood alley”. But no one can credibly blame the National Weather Service, which issued timely warnings in advance of the floods.
>>> Twisting the Truth: Extreme Weather and the Climate Narrative
According to Brian LaMarre, meteorologist-in-charge of the National Weather Service forecast office in Tampa, Florida, until he retired at the end of April: “This was an exceptional service to come out first with the catastrophic flash flood warning and this shows the awareness of the meteorologists on shift at the NWS office … the fact the catastrophic warning was issued first showed the level of urgency.”
There will be important lessons to be learnt from the tragedy, once the full facts are in. But that does not appear to be Senator Schumer’s aim. Instead, he seems to want to blame President Trump for the flood deaths, facts or no facts.
This is not a new tactic. In the wake of any natural disaster, there is often a rush to assign political blame. It’s easier to point fingers at Washington than to confront the uncomfortable truth that nature is unpredictable and that mistakes by individuals—even luck—can play a critical role in survival. The impulse to politicize tragedy may win headlines, but it does little to prevent future loss of life.
Bad weather also caused deaths during the Biden administration, such as Hurricane Ida in 2021 (more than 90 deaths in nine states, from Louisiana to New York); tropical Storm Helene in North Carolina in 2024 (108 deaths); and Hurricane Milton in Florida in 2024 (at least 40 deaths). Senator Schumer did not back then signal that President Biden was personally responsible for those tragedies.
In any case, his apparent assumption—that reducing staffing at the National Weather Service will inevitably result in extra deaths—is highly questionable. In the 21st century, with over 10,000 low earth orbit satellites spanning the globe, more technology and information about the weather from private companies as well as government sources are available than at any other point in history.
Consider the entertainment company Disney, which won a 2023 BlooLoop Innovation Award for its Disney Weather Check forecasting system. Disney needs accurate weather forecasts to organize visitor traffic in theme parks. Too much rain or heat, and people stay home. Big storms, and people aren’t safe. Its weather stations have solar-powered sensors, easy visualization tools, and timely alerts. Disney programs include WeatherBug and TempestOne for storm prediction, and HeatAlert and HeatGuardian for hot weather warnings.
Companies such as PlanetiQ, Spire, and Orbital Micro Systems feed data from satellites to computers for detailed analysis. These private-sector innovations are revolutionizing forecasting, often outpacing government capabilities. In fact, many government agencies now rely on data from companies to enhance their own models.
>>> Elon Built the DOGE Rocket and It’s Going To Keep Flying
Nor is rainfall necessarily related to climate change—another assertion regularly made by the Left. A new paper for the Heritage Foundation by Greek professors Theano Iliopoulou and Demetris Koutsoyiannis using 200 years of global data on rainfall concludes that variations in rainfall have “no systematic pattern”. However, some regions show more variations in rainfall than others.
Texas is one of those states with droughts and heavy rainfalls, and the Guadalupe River has seen past flooding. In 1987, a similar deluge killed 10 teen campers and almost drowned 33 more at Pot O Gold Christian Camp. What is important is to be prepared. Sometimes the forecast gets it wrong, but you can’t protect everyone against every risk all the time.
Senator Schumer wants to know the effects of budget cuts on future weather forecasting and disaster preparedness. But the real story is that major advances are coming from satellite data and private companies such as Disney. These new technologies often also cost less. The current administration is emphasizing the use of new, more accurate technology to improve weather forecasting and disaster response.
Blaming political opponents for natural disasters may be convenient, but it distracts from the real issues. The tragedy in Texas was not the result of a failure to forecast, but a question of whether enough speedy action was taken to heed the forecast, including by the local authorities. More will be gained by focusing less on partisan finger-pointing. Nature doesn’t care who sits in the Oval Office.
