Red Cross official to meet with lawmakers

Marty Evans, president and CEO of the American Red Cross, will brief lawmakers today on the organization’s recovery efforts in the Gulf Coast region, said congressional aides familiar with the meeting. The Red Cross, the largest nongovernmental organization operating in the hurricane- and flood-battered area, contacted House Republican Chairwoman Deborah Pryce (R-Ohio) earlier this month, asking whether lawmakers would be interested in a briefing.

Pryce passed along the Red Cross’s request to Rep. Peter King (R-N.Y.) last week after he was named chairman of the Homeland Security Committee. King, along with Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.), the ranking Democrat on the panel, arranged the meeting and invited Republican and Democratic lawmakers.

The briefing is the second bipartisan event organized by King; he led a trip with more than a dozen lawmakers to New Orleans on Sunday to view the damage caused by the flooding.

By Jonathan E. Kaplan