US judge rules that Trump plan to halve FEMA workforce violated law

A U.S. judge has ruled that the ​Trump administration broke the law by ordering the Federal Emergency Management Agency to cut its workforce in half. U.S. ‌District Judge Susan Illston in San Francisco in a decision issued late Friday said the U.S. Department of Homeland Security acted unlawfully by usurping FEMA's authority over its own personnel and steering the agency to cut thousands of disaster-response jobs. While FEMA is part of DHS, a federal law adopted after Hurricane Katrina in ​2005 says the department "may not substantially or significantly reduce (FEMA's) authorities, responsibilities, or functions.