Former FEMA Chief Michael Brown Slams Government Over Katrina

Former FEMA Director Mike Brown on the lessons learned from how Hurricane Katrina was handled and efforts to rebuild New Orleans in the 10 years since.

Ten years after Hurricane Katrina, former FEMA director Michael Brown says his biggest regret is that he didn't go to New Orleans right before the storm hit.

In an interview with FOX Business Network’s Sandra Smith, Brown said “what I really should have done was gotten on the plane then and gone straight to New Orleans and screamed it from the city of New Orleans -- and maybe people would have paid attention at that point.”

He said his dire warnings to evacuate New Orleans residents before the disaster “fell upon deaf ears.”

“The failure to use the planes, the trains the buses… to get those people out of there is what created the man-made disaster,” he said.

Brown said he should have used his authority to bring in more helicopters and amphibious equipment faster.

“I should have stood at the podium and said publicly 'I don’t know what the hell is going on back in Washington DC, but it needs to stop and these cabinet secretaries need to get off their butts and start doing what I ask for,'" he said.

He blamed big government for hurting the recovery.

“We should not be surprised that we haven’t recovered that well. This massive bureaucracy, all the rules and regulations that we have -- all the red tape is what slows down recovery,” he said.