The action has drawn sharp criticism from California officials who say Trump’s focus on permitting misses the central challenge facing survivors: money. Gov. Gavin Newsom said the state needs $33.9 billion in approved disaster aid, while survivors report that financial barriers — including insurance payouts and construction costs — far outweigh permitting delays as obstacles to rebuilding.
What the order does
President Trump signed an executive order Friday directing federal agencies to streamline permits for rebuilding homes destroyed by the January 2025 Los Angeles area wildfires, White House officials said Tuesday. The order seeks to preempt state and local permitting rules, allowing builders to “self-certify” compliance with building standards.
The Federal Emergency Management Agency and Small Business Administration are directed to “find a way to issue regulations” that would allow homeowners to rebuild without contending with “unnecessary, duplicative, or obstructive” permitting requirements, according to a White House statement. The order also directs federal agencies to expedite waivers and approvals to work around environmental, historic preservation, and natural resource laws that might slow rebuilding.
The order specifically instructs the Department of Homeland Security and FEMA to audit California’s use of Hazard Mitigation Grant Program funding. That audit must be completed within 60 days, after which officials are instructed to determine whether future conditions should be placed on the funding or whether “recoupment or recovery actions” should take place.
Officials clash on priorities
Gov. Gavin Newsom scoffed at the idea that the federal government could issue local rebuilding permits. “An executive order to rebuild Mars would do just as useful,” Newsom wrote on social media. He urged Trump to approve the state’s $33.9 billion disaster aid request instead, saying “please actually help us. We are begging you.”
Newsom noted that more than 1,600 rebuilding permits have already been issued in Los Angeles and officials are working at a fast pace.
Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass called Trump’s move a “political stunt.” Instead of targeting the permitting process, Bass said the Trump administration should speed FEMA reimbursements, demand that insurance companies pay survivors for their losses, and work with banks to extend mortgage forbearance and create special loan funds for fire survivors.
Bass acknowledged that permitting work is moving faster. Rebuilding plans in Pacific Palisades are being approved in half the time compared to single-family home projects citywide before the wildfires, she said. More than 70% of home permit clearances that are normally required are no longer required in that area.
The real barrier
Joy Chen, executive director of the Eaton Fire Survivor’s Network, a coalition of more than 10,000 survivors, said permitting assistance is “always welcome,” but it does not address the primary concern. “The number one barrier to Eaton and Palisades fire survivors right now is money,” Chen said.
The Palisades and Eaton fires killed 31 people and destroyed about 13,000 residential properties. The fires burned for more than three weeks beginning in January 2025, and cleanup efforts took about seven months.
One year after the fires began, fewer than a dozen homes had been rebuilt in Los Angeles County as of January 7. About 900 homes were under construction at that time.
In a December survey by the Department of Angels, a nonprofit that advocates for Los Angeles fire survivors, nearly one-third of survivors cited rebuild costs and insurance payouts as primary obstacles to rebuilding. Twenty-one percent mentioned permitting delays and barriers.
Funding gaps persist
Trump has not approved a single request from states for Hazard Mitigation Grant Program funding since March, part of a broader effort to reduce federal funding for climate mitigation. Survivors have struggled to secure payouts from insurance companies and face significant gaps between the money they have available and actual construction costs.