From the pulpit, Harris calls out Trump for disinformation about the hurricane

Article content

GREENVILLE, N.C. (AP) – Kamala Harris appeared Sunday before an audience of a mostly black church on a North Carolina battlefield to criticize Donald Trump for spreading misinformation about the government's response to the hurricane. President Joe Biden visited Florida for the second time this month to survey storm damage.

Article content

Harris, the Democratic presidential nominee, did not mention Trump by name, but he has been most visible among those pushing false claims about the Biden administration's response to hurricanes Milton and Helene. Florida was in the path of both storms, which also hit North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia.

The vice president spoke at the Koinonia Christian Center about “heroes” who help residents regardless of political affiliation.

“However, Church, there are those who do not act in the spirit of community and I am talking about those who literally do not tell the truth, lie about people who are working hard to help those in need, spreading disinformation when truth and facts are required,” he said Harris.

Article content

Article content

“The problem with this, beyond the obvious one, is that it makes it harder to get life-saving information to people if they believe they can't trust it,” she said. “And that is the pain of it all, which is that those who are in need have somehow been convinced that the forces are working against them in such a way that they will not seek help.”

Harris said their motives were clear: “to gain some advantage for themselves, to play politics with the goal of breaking other people's hearts, and that is unwise,” she said. “This is not the time to create fear. It's wrong to make people feel alone.”

“This is not how we know leaders act in times of crisis,” she said.

After Helene was struck in late September, Trump made a number of false claims, including that Washington was intentionally withholding aid from Republicans in need throughout the Southeast. The former president falsely claimed that the Federal Emergency Management Agency ran out of money to help them because it had all been spent on programs to help immigrants in the United States illegally.

Article content

He maintained that argument on Fox News Channel, stating that the White House response to the storm was “absolutely terrible” and repeating the claim about FEMA dollars. “It came out of there and everyone knew it,” Trump said in the interview, which aired Sunday and was taped Thursday.

Before Harris spoke at the church, Biden was on a helicopter flight between Tampa and St. Beach. Pete was on the Gulf Coast surveying hurricane damage. From the air, he saw the torn roof of Tropicana Field, home of the Tampa Bay Rays baseball team. The president saw flooded household appliances on the ground, piling up in front of flooded houses. Some have fallen.

The president expressed gratitude that it wasn't as bad in Milton as officials had predicted, but it was still a “disaster” for those in the storm's path, including many who lost irreplaceable personal items. He also praised first responders, some of whom were from Canada.

Article content

“In times like these, we come together to take care of each other, not as Democrats or Republicans, but as Americans,” Biden said after hearing from federal, state and local officials and meeting with some residents and first responders. “We are one United States, one United States.

Harris began her second day in North Carolina with a speech at a Greenville church as part of the “Souls to the Polls” campaign, aimed at helping increase Black church attendance ahead of the Nov. 5 election.

She has planned a rally later Sunday to talk about her economic plans and highlight Thursday's start of early voting in the state, her campaign says.

In Florida, which Biden visited the Big Bend region on Oct. 3 after Helene hit, the president announced $612 million for six Department of Energy projects in hurricane-affected areas aimed at strengthening the regional power grid. The money includes $47 million for Gainesville Regional Utilities and $47 million for Switched Source partnering with Florida Power and Light.

Article content

Just over three weeks before the election, hurricanes added another dimension to the tight presidential race.

Trump said the Biden administration failed to respond to the storm, particularly in western North Carolina after Helene. Biden and Harris blast Trump for promoting lies about the federal response.

Biden said Trump is “not the only one” guilty of spreading disinformation, but he has the “biggest mouth.”

“They blame me for everything. Everything's fine,” Trump told Fox.

Biden urged Congress to act quickly to provide the Small Business Administration and FEMA with the resources needed to weather the Atlantic hurricane season, which ends on November 30. He said Friday that Milton alone caused an estimated $50 billion in damage.

Article content

FEMA is part of the Department of Homeland Security, and Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas has said hurricane season is not over yet and there are other natural disasters the agency needs to prepare for.

“We don't know what will happen tomorrow, whether it will be another hurricane, tornado, fire, earthquake. We have to be ready. And it's not good government to rely on day-to-day survival as opposed to proper planning,” Mayorkas said on CBS' “Face the Nation.”

House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-LA, said there is plenty of time and that lawmakers will address the funding issue when Congress returns to session after the Nov. 5 election.

“We will provide additional resources,” Johnson told CBS.

Milton made landfall in Florida as a Category 3 storm Wednesday evening. At least 10 people have died and hundreds of thousands of residents remain without electricity.

Authorities say that if not for widespread evacuations, the death toll could have been higher. The still fresh devastation from Helena just two weeks earlier likely forced many people to flee.

Article content