'Not true': CNN host puts Trump spokeswoman on the spot over ex-president's FEMA lies

CNN's Kate Bolduan on Wednesday put Trump campaign spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt on the spot for lies former President Donald Trump has been telling about the Federal Emergency Management Agency's response to Hurricane Helene.

At the start of the interview, Bolduan played a clip of Rep. Chuck Edwards (R-NC) telling CNN this week that there was no evidence to back up claims that FEMA has been deliberately holding back funds for Americans in need of disaster aid and diverting that money to undocumented immigrants.

She then turned to Leavitt and confronted her about the former president's falsehoods.

"Let's keep to the facts, which is on that suggestion that Donald Trump did make that they were stealing money from FEMA and using it, and it's all gone because they were using it to house migrants, that's not true," she said. "There is no disaster relief fund money that is going to house migrants."

"I don't think people care which pocket the money came from," Leavitt replied. "They do care that their tax dollars, $1 billion of their tax dollars, went toward housing migrants!"

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However, this response evaded answering Bolduan's question about their being no evidence that FEMA diverted funds meant to help Americans recover from disasters and put them toward undocumented immigrants.

Leavitt then proceeded to rant about President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris's response to Hurricane Helene.

At this point, Bolduan turned back to question Leavitt about Trump's decision in 2019 to divert emergency response funds from FEMA to immigration-related programs at the southern border.

"He told Congress that he was intending at the time in 2019 to shift $271 million from DHS, including $155 million from FEMA's disaster relief fund, to pay for detaining and transporting undocumented immigrants," she said.

"What President Trump didn't do was allow an open-border policy!" Leavitt replied.

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