Even federal disaster relief is not safe from Trump.

Public officials have started pleading with the Trump administration for help in recovering from deadly disasters as President Donald Trump triggers frustration in states struck by tornadoes, floods and storms by taking no action on requests for aid.

Trump has left states, counties and tribes in limbo as he delays making decisions on formal requests for millions of dollars in Federal Emergency Management Agency funding. Some areas that are still reeling from extreme weather are unable to start cleanup.

“We’re at a standstill and waiting on a declaration from FEMA,” said Royce McKee, emergency management director in Walthall County, Mississippi, which was hit by tornadoes in mid-March.

You’d think tornadoes would be apolitical, but apparently not.

The county of 13,000 people can’t afford to clean up acres of debris, McKee said, and is waiting for Trump to act on a disaster request that was submitted by Gov. Tate Reeves, a Republican, on April 1 after the tornadoes killed seven people, destroyed or damaged 671 homes, and caused $18.2 million in public damage.

Sorry, Trump is too busy talking to Fox News and shutting down whole departments to pay attention to some dreary county in Mississippi.

The frustration over Trump’s handling of disasters is the latest upheaval involving FEMA. Trump recently canceled two FEMA grant programs that gave states billions of dollars a year to pay for protective measures against disasters. The move drew protests from Republican and Democratic lawmakers.

On May 8, Trump fired FEMA leader Cameron Hamilton and replaced him with David Richardson, a former Marine Corps officer who has no experience in emergency management.

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Eleven of the 17 pending disaster requests were sent to Trump more than a month ago.

“This looks to me like, until FEMA’s role is clarified, then we’re just going to sit on it,” said a former senior FEMA official who was granted anonymity to speak candidly.

Trump has indicated that he wants to shrink the agency, which distributes about $45 billion in disaster aid a year, helps with as many as 100 disasters at a time and, he said, “has been a very big disappointment.”

“It’s very bureaucratic and very slow,” Trump said in January during a visit to disaster-stricken western North Carolina.

So the solution is to make it even slower until it grinds to a halt.

White House spokesperson Abigail Jackson said the administration wants state and local governments “to invest in their own resilience before disaster strikes, making response less urgent and recovery less prolonged.”

And his way of making this happen is just to ignore requests for help. He’s such a sweetie.