Anna Paulina Luna calls on Mike Johnson to reconvene Congress for hurricane relief

U.S. Rep. Anna Paulina Luna wants Congress to reconvene and pass additional hurricane relief funding.

The St. Petersburg Republican took to social media to demand that House Speaker Mike Johnson take up supplemental funding for the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). She called on funding a day after Hurricane Milton struck Florida, making landfall south of Tampa Bay near Siesta Key.

“Just got off the phone with President Biden. He is personally overseeing that FEMA does not create problems with the debris removal and is supportive of the $15 Billion in FEMA funds ONLY FOR Hurricane victims,” Luna posted on X. “If Congress goes into a special session, we can get it passed immediately. This needs to happen. Speaker Johnson, call us back.”

The Republican issued her call shortly after Whitney Fox, the Democrat challenging Luna’s re-election in Florida’s 13th Congressional District, similarly said Congress should pass additional funding immediately.

Luna joins several Democratic colleagues who also want Congress to take up additional funding before the election.

U.S. Rep. Jared Moskowitz, a Parkland Democrat, co-led a letter to Johnson on Wednesday demanding the Speaker bring Representatives back to Washington to pass additional relief and sustainability funding for FEMA. Democratic U.S. Reps. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick, Maxwell Frost, Darren Soto and Frederica Wilson all co-signed the letter.

“We write to you amidst a season marked by unprecedented natural disasters and increasingly severe weather events that have left communities across our nation in dire need of additional and comprehensive disaster relief funding,” the letter reads.

But that letter was only signed by Democrats. Luna’s post calling on Johnson stands out for coming from within the Republican caucus.

Ahead of the storm, Johnson already said he does not believe Congress needs to reconvene. While President Joe Biden has urged Congress to pass an additional funding package, Johnson said a budget deal passed in September should provide stopgap funding, and that if FEMA needed more, Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas should have asked for funding before that point. Budgeting more now would be premature, Johnson told Fox News last week.

Since the budget deal passed, two hurricanes have substantially impacted Florida, with Hurricane Helene making landfall on Sept. 27 and seriously impacting CD 13 with flooding.

Notably, Fox has criticized Luna for voting against the budget deal, effectively voting to shut down the government a day before Helene struck the state. Luna’s campaign last month pushed back on those attacks.

“Whitney Fox is clueless as to how FEMA works,” Luna spokesperson Olivia Carson said.

Meanwhile, Luna between hurricanes campaigned with Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump in North Carolina, where she criticized the Biden administration’s response and FEMA. At a Tar Heel State rally, she asserted that FEMA had “intentionally not helped out residents” because “it’s red communities impacted,” according to reporting by NC Insider.