Posted on 09/11/2018 6:49:24 PM PDT by Ennis85
President Donald Trump has been criticised for hailing the US response to the deadly Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico last year as "tremendous".
The mayor of its capital tweeted: "If he thinks the death of 3,000 people is a success God help us all."
Puerto Rico only finished restoring full power last month, 11 months after the hurricane hit.
A recent report says 8% left the island after the hurricane and many died due to poor health care and other services.
The island's Governor Ricardo Rossello issued a statement on Tuesday night, describing Maria as "the worst natural disaster in our modern history. Our basic infrastructure was devastated, thousands of our people lost their lives and many others still struggle".
Puerto Rico, an unincorporated territory of the US. is home to some 3.3 million people.
What did the president say?
He was asked at the White House what lessons could be learned from Hurricane Maria as Hurricane Florence bears down on the Carolinas.
Maria, he said, was the "hardest one we had by far because of the island nature", adding: "I actually think it was one of the best jobs that's ever been done with respect to what this is all about.
"The job that Fema [the Federal Emergency Management Agency] and law enforcement and everybody did working along with the governor in Puerto Rico, I think was tremendous. I think that Puerto Rico was an incredible, unsung success."
Mr Trump had said recently: "We have put billions and billions of dollars into Puerto Rico and it was a very tough one. I think most of the people in Puerto Rico really appreciate what we've done."
What has the response been to his latest comments?
Puerto Rico Governor Ricardo Rossello said in a statement:
(Excerpt) Read more at bbc.com ...
My husband had a job offer there several years ago. Luxury resort, upper management. I said hell no I wont go.
Its so third world. Crime is terrible.
And I wonder how many of those 3000-5600 have established new identities in Florida and other places, to avoid whatever back home. Now getting a whole new set of benefits from Uncle Sam.
Kind of like Katrina, when the New Orleans refugees would go to all the different assistance centers and claim that everything they owned was destroyed in the flooding. Collecting checks all day, every day.
Show the names of the dead first making my morning the claim. Hey is there a coroner in Puerto Rico?
It’s all over twitter tonight that there’s an entire runway covered in bottled water that was never distributed. How the hell does that happen?
Ungrateful @holes. Mayor of San Juan is absolutely corrupt and incompetent.
Success would be to give it back to Spain.
We have a relative who audits a check cashing company. He says the PR office is a joke with all the corruption.
When? Make that still do. The Baptist Church somehow or an other gave (free) a group from Katrina a bunch of the BEST PRIME property in this county. They’ve gone gung ho building tax free housing for their “church officials.” While other churches in the area have one free from taxes house for their pastor, this place is a sprawling community of tax free housing.
What Puerto Rico DID with what we sent is entirely on THEM.
I vacationed there a couple of years ago. We had a nice time. I never felt safe. Just like SAn Fran and Europe, Been there done that. No need to revisit.
Bingo. Truck drivers went on strike. Food and water aid was rationed by political considerations, much aid was stolen, containers of supplies were left on the pier.
Puerto Rico should be put under military rule.
My girlfriend is from PR, her family is hear too in FL. They all hate the mayor (corrupt) and the government steals all moneys that come from the US to enrich themselves. That is PR. Beautiful island, great fishing, corrupt government.
I don’t care one bit about PR
Not one person yet has pointed to a single thing FEMA did WRONG in that response, but they all critizise his statement that it was the best response we’ve had.
I doubt it was teh “best response”, because Trump loves to say anything he does is the “best ever” even when it is clearly not true.
But what mistakes are these people saying FEMA made? What would they have done differently in the aftermath of that hurricane? What things do they think the adminsitration did wrong in preparing for hurricanes/ What is the actual complaint?
Yeah, I wonder if these same people think we should fault the firefighters in new york for their response to 9/11, since 2900 people died.
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