By Michael Woyton
People have long thought that convicted felon and former president Donald Trump will do and say anything to take over the White House once again, thereby avoiding going to jail.
Until recently, one of the most obvious things was scuttling a bipartisan border security bill, telling GOP leaders that it would give the Democrats a win and lessen his chances of victory by taking away the immigration talking point.
During a January Las Vegas rally, Trump told the crowd, “Please blame it on me,” according to The Washington Post.
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Then Hurricane Helene tore through southern states, jumping trillions of gallons of rain, and leaving at least 225 people dead and untold numbers unaccounted for.
Almost from the get-go, Trump and his MAGA followers began casting aspersions on the federal response to the second deadliest hurricane to hit the mainland United States since Katrina.
During a nearly two-hour rally Sunday in Juneau, Wisconsin, the Republican presidential candidate criticized the Biden administration’s response to Helene, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported.
He leveled the blame on Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic presidential candidate, saying she left the victims stranded.
“This is the worst response to a storm or a catastrophe or a hurricane that we’ve ever seen,” the Journal Sentinel quoted Trump as saying. “And, you know, it’s a largely Republican area, so some people say they did it for that reason.”
Those comments come from man who, as president, delayed aid to Puerto Rico, withholding about $20 billion in funds following Hurricane Maria in 2017, NBC News reported.
A report from the Department of Housing and Urban Development Office of the Inspector General, released in April 2021, said there were “unprecedented procedural hurdles that produced delays in the disbursement of the congressionally approved funds,” NBC said.
Audits by the OIG said that Puerto Rico needed a better system for requesting federal grants and keeping track of them, but noted that Texas and Florida had similar issues, but their money wasn’t held up after disasters.
We won’t even talk about Trump tossing rolls of paper towels at struggling Puerto Rican hurricane victims, many of whom were still without electricity two weeks after Maria hit.
Some in the GOP are pushing back on Trump’s lies about the government’s disaster response.
U.S. Senator Thom Tillis, R-NC, said that that focus needs to stay on rescue and recovery operations, and “we don’t need any o these distractions on the ground. It is at the expense of the hard-working first responders and people that are just trying to recover their lives.”
CNN’s Daniel Dale put together a list of lies and distortions that Trump has continued to spread, calling the presidential nominee “one of the country’s leading deceivers on the subject.”
Among them are: Trump saying Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp hasn’t been able to get in touch with the president; Trump saying the administration’s response to Helene had “universally negative reviews”; and saying Harris spent all of the FEMA money on housing illegal migrants and that $1 billion of FEMA money is “missing.”
And Trump’s supporters are doing their part to spread the lies and try to dissuade anyone who may desperately need aid from trusting FEMA and the rest of the government.
It’s one thing for Trump to say that he only can fix everything he thinks is wrong with America or that Harris is “mentally impaired.”
The man lied more than 30,000 times during his time in office. So what are the odds that he’s turned the page and is now telling the truth?
But the people affected by Hurricane Helene deserve better. They deserve the truth. The deserve help.
They do not deserve the lies of Donald Trump that only are designed to help him.
HELPING VICTIMS OF HURRICANE HELENE:
Lead art: Screen grab from PBS News via YouTube
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