Welcome to the politics of disaster relief.
Republicans are excoriating the Biden/Harris administration for how it responded to Hurricane Helene in North Carolina, Tennessee and other parts of the South. This is now about to be a double whammy as Hurricane Milton bears down on Florida.
It unfolds amid a tight presidential election. So the disaster response is now infused with politics in swing states like North Carolina and Georgia. There is also a competitive but not top-tier Senate race in Florida.
Storms can disrupt the typical electorate. The usual people who vote might not make it to the polls. It’s hard to care about voting if you’re low on food, lack electricity and can’t even make it out of the holler in western North Carolina because Helene wrecked the road.
‘IMMEDIATELY RECONVENE’: SCOTT URGES SCHUMER TO RECALL SENATE AMID HELENE’S DEVASTATION
Pray tell, where should you vote in Tampa or Sarasota if your basement is swamped by Milton – after getting drenched when Helene spun through a few weeks ago? You were going to vote at the school down the street. But now it lacks power. You’re now living at your sister’s house inland. But you’re not registered to vote there …
You see what we’re getting at.
Republicans are hammering the Biden/Harris administration for its response to the storm.
“It’s like the DMV at industrial scale,” said Republican vice presidential nominee and Sen. JD Vance, R-Ohio, on Fox. “It is incompetence of the highest order.”
“At the federal level, this has been a massive failure,” said House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La. “When you talk to the people who are directly affected, they will tell you that this has been an abject failure. FEMA has lost sight of its core mission. The administration has not shown that they were prepared for this eventuality in this terrible disaster.”
With the South reeling from Hurricane Helene’s path of devastation and Hurricane Milton on the way, the politics of disaster relief are, yet again,…
