The States of America

We are preparing for the removal of the “United”

Last week, I had the privilege of attending the 2026 NACCHO Preparedness Summit in a professional capacity. I sat in many rooms with people responsible for preparing this country for disaster.

And we could not speak plainly about what is happening.

We spoke in euphemisms. In softened language. In phrases designed to describe the impacts of disruption without addressing the root cause.

Funding cuts were “cyclical.”
The loss of federal structures was “a shift in priorities.”
The unraveling of coordination was spoken of as something temporary, familiar, and manageable.

It is none of those things.

In the hallways, the language changed. It became more honest. More precise. People spoke in fragments of truth, careful but clear enough to recognize. What is happening is not a cycle. It is not a routine correction. It is not a temporary misalignment.

It is a withdrawal.

And we are being trained, professionally and rhetorically, to behave as if it is not.

The dissonance was not just in the words. It was in the room itself.

The people doing the work – those responsible for planning, coordination, and response – spoke with a kind of grounded urgency. Their language was careful because it had to be. Their concern was real because it is lived.

And then there were those who came to address them.

Dark suits. Red ties. A posture of authority that did not match the moment. Their tone carried a kind of paternal, condescending reassurance. A patience without empathy. It was not openly hostile. It was something more corrosive: a quiet dismissal of the reality in front of them, paired with the expectation that the room would absorb it.

The message, stripped of language, was simple:

‘We are not responsible for anything. You are on your own. This is just the way it is. Figure it out.’

We were to process as if this new system still served its original purpose.

It does not.

Inside the sessions, the work continued. But the nature of the work has changed.

We are no longer planning for how to sustain a response until we can work with our federal partners.

We are planning for what happens when they do not return our calls.

We are being asked to develop local stockpiles. To build regional coalitions. To establish parallel networks of coordination across states and jurisdictions that were never expected to operate independently at this scale.

On its surface, this is framed as resilience. And to a point, it is. There is value in strengthening local capacity. There is value in relationships that do not rely on a single point of failure.

But that is not the full story.

Because these conversations are not happening in addition to a functioning federal system.

They are happening in place of one.

The underlying assumption has shifted. Even if we are not allowed to name it directly:

You are on your own, and you should prepare accordingly.

This would be difficult enough under stable conditions. It becomes untenable under the conditions we are actually facing.

The reality of large-scale disasters is that they overwhelm local capacity. That is why national coordination exists. That is why specialized resources are distributed and maintained across the country. That is why there is supposed to be a system capable of seeing the whole and responding at scale.

That system is being forced to atrophy.

And in its place, two things are emerging.

First, fragmentation.

States and regions are beginning to organize themselves into formal and informal alliances, attempting to recreate coordination through proximity and partnership. This will produce uneven outcomes. Some areas will be better positioned than others. Some will have the relationships and resources to compensate. Others will not.

We are not building a stronger system.

We are building a patchwork.

Second, substitution.

Where public capacity recedes, private actors step forward. Not as a matter of conspiracy, but as a matter of incentive. Scarcity creates markets. Gaps in coordination create opportunities.

The solution increasingly offered to localities is extractive. Not investment in supporting local capacity, but mandates without funding that drives local dollars to procure private solutions.

If you cannot rely on shared infrastructure, you can purchase what you need – provided you can afford it.

This is not resilience.

This is the redistribution of risk downward, and the sale of stability back at a premium.

We are already seeing the consequences in smaller ways. Funding that supports essential roles is being reduced or destabilized. Individuals who were already responsible for coordinating preparedness across multiple rural jurisdictions are being asked to do more with less, or to continue under conditions of uncertainty that makes any sense of job security impossible.

Capacity is not just infrastructure. It is people.

And we are thinning it.

All of this points toward a future that is difficult to describe directly, but increasingly easy to recognize.

A country that still exists in name, but not in function.

A system where coordination is optional, uneven, and contingent.

A reality in which the “United” is no longer assumed.

We are not being asked to solve new problems.

We are being asked to adapt to the removal of the structures that once made solutions possible.

And to call that adaptation progress.

When the next large-scale crisis comes – and it will – this will not be an abstract failure.

It will be visible. It will be measurable. It will be experienced unevenly, with some communities able to absorb the shock and others left exposed.

And we will recognize it.

Because we are already preparing for it.

Just not together.