The vast damage Hurricane Helene did to the southeastern United States from Sept. 26 to 29 was another demonstration that climate change is real. Republicans whose political careers have been financed by Big Oil and other polluters have been in denial about climate change for decades. But farmers know climate change is real, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz noted at the Vice Presidential Debate Oct. 1. “They’ve seen 500 year droughts, 500 year floods, back to back.”
Hurricane Helene made landfall with Category 4 intensity on the evening of Sept. 26 in the Big Bend region of western Florida, near the city of Perry, with maximum sustained winds of 140 mph. Helene weakened as it veered north inland but it still had plenty of rain to dump before it dissipated on Sept. 29, leaving many in its path without working roads, power food, and water. Catastrophic rain triggered flooding in western North Carolina, eastern Tennessee and southwestern Virginia, and spawned numerous tornadoes. The death toll attributed to the storm was at least 231 across six states.
Scientists at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory estimate that “climate change may have caused as much as 50% more rainfall during Hurricane Helene in some parts of Georgia and the Carolinas” in its 500-mile path inland.
Helene’s huge size and speed are linked to increasingly hotter water in the Gulf of Mexico. Steve Curwood noted at InsideClimateNews.org. hurricanes have usually weakened when they make landfall, but Helene’s impact was just as devastating in the inland mountains of western North Carolina as on the Gulf Coast of Florida.
During the storm, President Joe Biden put the Federal Emergency Management Agency at the service of the stricken states.
In reaction, Donald Trump told outrageous and reckless lies, as he tried to take political advantage over the catastrophe. He even blamed immigrants as well as the administration for hampering the response.
Trump wrote on Truth Social Monday, Sept. 30, that he planned to go to North Carolina, “but don’t like the reports that I’m getting about the Federal Government, and the Democrat Governor of the State, going out of their way to not help people in Republican areas.” But there is no evidence that the Biden administration was ignoring Republican areas. In fact, Republican governors in Virginia, South Carolina and Tennessee praised the Biden administration for its fast response, and FEMA designated counties in several states — including dozens won by Trump in the 2020 presidential election — as eligible to apply for federal assistance.
At a news conference Sept. 30, Trump said of Republican Georgia Gov. Kemp, “He’s been calling the president, hasn’t been able to get him.” But earlier in the day Kemp said he had talked with Biden the previous day. Kemp said he missed the president’s initial call Sept. 29. “He just said, ‘Hey, what do you need?’ And I told him: ‘You know, we got what we need. We’ll work through the federal process.’ He offered that if there’s other things we need, just to call him directly, which I appreciate that. But we’ve had FEMA embedded with us since a day or two before the storm hit in our state operations center in Atlanta; we’ve got a great relationship with them.”
Republican South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster said at an Oct. 1 press conference that federal assistance had “been superb,” noting Biden and Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg had both called and told him to let them know whatever the state needed. McMaster also said FEMA Administrator Deanne Criswell had called.
Still, in a social media post Oct. 3, Trump wrote that Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris “are universally being given POOR GRADES for the way that they are handling the Hurricane, especially in North Carolina.”
CNN’s fact checker, Daniel Dale, wrote, “That wasn’t even close to accurate. Though the Biden administration’s response had certainly received criticism, it had also been praised by various state and local leaders — including the Republican governors of some of the affected states and the Democratic governor of North Carolina, plus local leaders including the Democratic mayor of the hard-hit North Carolina city of Asheville,” which saw historic water level rises after it received 13.98 inches of rain Sept. 25-27.
In a Michigan rally Oct. 3, Trump placed Kamala Harris at the helm, lying that “Kamala spent all her FEMA money, billions of dollars, on housing for illegal migrants, many of whom should not be in our country.” He added a related conspiracy theory: “They stole the FEMA money, just like they stole it from a bank, so they could give it to their illegal immigrants that they want to have vote for them this season.”
First, there is no scheme to get undocumented immigrants to vote illegally in November. Voting by noncitizens is a felony.
Second, there is no basis for claiming FEMA disaster assistance money was stolen — by anyone, let alone Harris personally — for housing migrants. No disaster funding has been spent on those shelters.
In late September, President Biden signed into law short-term funding that extended 2024 fiscal year funding levels through Dec. 20. It specifically gave FEMA access to a full year’s worth of disaster relief funding.
“FEMA absolutely has enough money for Helene response right now,” Keith Turi, acting director of FEMA’s Office of Response and Recovery said. He noted that Congress recently replenished the agency with $20 billion, and about $8 billion of that is set aside for recovery from previous storms and mitigation projects.
Trump repeated his debunked claim about migrants getting FEMA money to reporters at least twice on Friday, Oct. 4 — and then said it again at a Friday night town hall in North Carolina.
Saturday, Oct. 5, Trump falsely claimed at a campaign rally in Pennsylvania the federal government was only giving $750 to people who lost their homes. “Think of it: We give foreign countries hundreds of billions of dollars and we’re handing North Carolina $750,” he said.
As FEMA explained earlier in the week, trying to to combat misinformation, $750 is merely the immediate aid survivors can get to cover basic, pressing needs like food, water, baby formula and emergency supplies. Survivors may apply for additional forms of assistance, such as for temporary housing and home repairs, that can be worth thousands of dollars; the current maximum amount for home repair assistance, for example, is $42,500.
Trump also claimed at the Pennsylvania rally there were no helicopters doing rescues in North Carolina, which was nonsense as National Guard helicopters were delivering supplies, picking up stranded people, dropping off firefighters and search-and-rescue crews and radioing for assistance for others who could be ccessed from the ground..
Meanwhile, as another hurricane, Milton, heads toward Tampa, Fla, the lies of Trump and running mate J.D. Vance are magnified on social media and have an impact on low-information voters who respond to wild rumors. All Kamala Harris and Tim Walz have to offer in response is competent leadership. — JMC
From The Progressive Populist, November 1, 2024
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