Former FEMA boss says border situation is not an emergency

WASHINGTON (AP) — The former head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency said Thursday that what's happening on the U.S. southern border is no emergency.

Craig Fugate, who ran the national disaster agency for nearly eight years under President Barack Obama and was head of Florida's disaster agency under a Republican governor, said the push of refugees seeking asylum on the border with Mexico is not a national emergency.

President Donald Trump has called it a crisis and is weighing a national emergency declaration to bypass a reluctant Congress and fund his long-promised border wall. It is the issue that has led to the extended partial government shutdown.