WASHINGTON (AP) — Democratic presidential nominee Kamala Harris is heading to North Carolina on Saturday as the state recovers from Hurricane Helene, arriving there one day after a visit by Republican Donald Trump, who is spreading false claims about the federal response to the disaster.
Earlier in the week, Harris was in Georgia, where she helped distribute meals, toured the damage and consoled families hard-hit by the storm. President Joe Biden, too, visited the disaster zone. During stops over two days in the Carolinas, Florida and Georgia, Biden surveyed the damage and met with farmers whose crops have been destroyed.
The two have been vocal and visible about the government's willingness to help, and the administration's efforts so far include covering costs for all of the rescue and recovery efforts across the Southeast for several months as states struggle under the weight of the mass damage.
In a letter late Friday to congressional leaders, Biden wrote that while the Federal Emergency Management Agency's Disaster Relief Fund "has the resources it requires right now to meet immediate needs, the fund does face a shortfall at the end of the year.” He also called on lawmakers to act quickly to restore funding to the Small Business Administration’s disaster loan program.
More than 200 people have died. It's the worst storm to hit the U.S. mainland since Katrina in 2005, and scientists have warned such storms will only worsen in the face of climate change.
But in this overheated election year, even natural disasters have become deeply politicized as the candidates crisscross the disaster area and in some cases visit the same venues to win over voters in battleground states.
Trump has falsely claimed the Biden administration isn't doing enough to help impacted people in Republican areas and has harshly criticized the response. He has, in Helene's aftermath, espoused falsehoods about climate change, calling it “one of the great scams of all time."
During a stop in Fayetteville, North Carolina on Thursday, Trump renewed his complaints about the federal response and cited “lousy treatment to North Carolina in particular." In fact, the state's Democratic governor, Roy Cooper, said this week the state has already seen more than 50,000 people be registered for FEMA assistance, and about $6 billion has been paid out.
Biden, meanwhile, has suggested the Republican House speaker is withholding critical disaster funding.
Harris’ visits, meanwhile, present an additional political test in the midst of a humanitarian crisis. She’s trying to step into a role for which Biden is well known — showing the empathy that Americans expect in times of tragedy — in the closing stretch of her White House campaign.
Until this week, she had not visited the scene of a humanitarian crisis as vice president — that duty was reserved for Biden, who has frequently been called on to survey damage and console victims after tornadoes, wildfires, tropical storms and more.
Harris said this week that she wanted to “personally take a look at the devastation, which is extraordinary.” She expressed admiration for how “people are coming together. People are helping perfect strangers.”
She said that shows ”the vast majority of us have so much more in common than what separates us,” an echo of a line she frequently uses on the campaign trail.
“We are here for the long haul,” she said.
Associated Press writers Makiya Seminera in Boone, North Carolina, and Meg Kinnard in Fayetteville, North Carolina, contributed.
Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris speaks during a rally at the Dort Financial Center in Flint, Mich., Friday, Oct. 4, 2024. (AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein)
Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris speaks during a rally at the Dort Financial Center in Flint, Mich., Friday, Oct. 4, 2024. (AP Photo/Mark Schiefelbein)
BUTLER, Pa. (AP) — Former President Donald Trump plans to return Saturday to the site where a gunman tried to assassinate him in July, setting aside what are now near-constant worries for his physical safety in order to fulfill a promise — “really an obligation,” he said recently — to the people of Butler, Pennsylvania.
“I'll probably start off by saying, ‘As I was saying ...’” the Republican presidential nominee has joked, in a bit of black humor about a speech cut short when a bullet struck Trump's ear and he was whisked off stage — fist aloft — with blood dripping across his face.
Trump's running mate, Ohio Sen. JD Vance, also will be on hand at the Butler Farm Show grounds, as will billionaire Elon Musk, as the campaign elevates the headline-generating potential of his return with just 30 days to go in their tight campaign against Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris and Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz.
The campaign is predicting tens of thousands of people will attend what is being pitched as a "tribute to the American spirit.” Local hotels, motels and inns are reportedly full and some eager rallygoers were already arriving Friday, according to a local Facebook page.
“President Trump looks forward to returning to Butler, Pennsylvania to honor the victims from that tragic day," said Trump campaign spokesperson Karoline Leavitt. "The willingness of Pennsylvanians to join President Trump in his return to Butler represents the strength and resiliency of the American people.”
Trump will use the 5 p.m. Eastern time event to remember Corey Comperatore, a volunteer firefighter struck and killed at the July 13 rally, and to recognize the two other rallygoers injured, David Dutch and James Copenhaver. They and Trump were struck when 20-year-old shooter Thomas Matthew Crooks, of Bethel Park, Pennsylvania, opened fire from an unsecured rooftop nearby before he was fatally shot by sharpshooters.
How Crooks managed to outmaneuver law enforcement that day and scramble on top of a building within easy shooting distance of the ex-president is among myriad questions that remain unanswered about the worst Secret Service security failure in decades. Another is his motive, which has never been determined.
Butler County District Attorney Rich Goldinger told WPXI-TV this week that “everyone is doubling down on their efforts to make sure this is done safely and correctly.”
Mike Slupe, the county sheriff, told the station he estimates the Secret Service — which has undergone a painful reckoning over its handling of two attempts on Trump’s life — is deploying ”quadruple the assets” it did in July.
Butler County, on the western edge of a coveted presidential swing state, is a Trump stronghold. He won the county — where turnout hovers around an impressive 80% — with about 66% of the vote in both 2016 and 2020. About 57% of Butler County’s 139,000 registered voters are Republicans, compared with about 29% who are Democrats and 14% something else.
Three months later, townspeople are divided over the value of his return. Heidi Priest, a Butler resident who started a Facebook group supporting Harris, said Trump's last visit fanned political tensions in the city.
“Whenever you see people supporting him and getting excited about him being here, it scares the people who don’t want to see him reelected,” she said.
But Trump needs to drive up voter turnout in conservative strongholds like Butler County, an overwhelmingly white, rural-suburban community, if he wants to win Pennsylvania in November. Harris, too, has targeted her campaign efforts at Pennsylvania, rallying there repeatedly as part of her aggressive outreach in critical swing states.
Bleachers are set up ahead of a campaign rally for Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump at the Butler Farm Show, Friday, Oct. 4, 2024, in Butler, Pa. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
Bleachers are set up ahead of a campaign event for Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump at the Butler Farm Show, Friday, Oct. 4, 2024, in Butler, Pa. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
A statue of Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump is set up on a truck ahead of a campaign event at the Butler Farm Show, Friday, Oct. 4, 2024, in Butler, Pa. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
FILE - Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump reacts following an assassination attempt at a campaign event in Butler, Pa., July 13, 2024. (AP Photo/Gene J. Puskar, File)
FILE - Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump is surrounded by U.S. Secret Service agents at a campaign rally, July 13, 2024, in Butler, Pa. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci, File)
A statue of Republican presidential nominee former President Donald Trump is set up on a truck ahead of a campaign event at the Butler Farm Show, Friday, Oct. 4, 2024, in Butler, Pa. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
