POSTED: 11:38 pm EDT September 15, 2005
NEW YORK -- The former director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency who became a lightning rod for the sluggish federal response to Hurricane Katrina has put the blame on state officials.
Michael Brown told The New York Times that within hours of Katrina's attack on New Orleans he told the White House that state officials couldn't get their act together. Brown said he called Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff and White House chief of staff Andrew Card to let them know the situation was out of control.
His account suggests the White House knew right away that the storm was leaving the coast in shambles.
A top administration official told the Times that White House officials remember Brown's calls, but don't think they had the urgency he recalls. <snip>