President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris will make separate trips Wednesday to deal with the devastation caused by Hurricane Helene, which has killed at least 150 people.
Biden ietc is expected Visit North Carolina and days after South Carolina, the storm swept across Florida and moved north, causing damage as far north as Tennessee and Virginia.
Harris will visit Georgia, where former President Donald Trump visited on Monday and criticized the Harris and Biden administrations for their response to the hurricane.
Biden first plans to land in Greenville, South Carolina, where he will take an aerial tour of the storm-ravaged city. He will then travel to Raleigh, North Carolina for a briefing at the emergency operations center and then fly to Asheville, one of the areas hardest hit by the flooding.
The storm wreaked havoc in the western North Carolina city, leaving many residents without water, power, cell phone and Internet access.
During a virtual meeting with North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper and Administrator Deanne Criswell on Monday, Biden said the federal government is helping states reopen roads, remove debris, restore power, support search and rescue efforts and bring cell networks back online. Federal Emergency Management Agency.
“I want you to know that the administration is going to be there … until we get the job done. It’s going to take a very long time and a significant amount of assets,” Biden said.
Cooper said the federal government is helping deploy medical resources, as well as land bridges and helicopters for search and rescue operations.
Criswell has been based in North Carolina’s Appalachia region since Biden ordered Monday to stay there for the foreseeable future. On Tuesday, more than 1,200 FEMA and other agency workers were in North Carolina, with at least 25 trailers of food and 60 trailers of water delivered to the state, the White House said.
During Harris’ visit to Georgia, he will receive an on-site briefing on recovery efforts, the White House said. Harris, the Democratic presidential nominee, “will provide an update on Federal actions to support emergency response and recovery efforts in Georgia and several other states in the Southeast,” according to the White House. On Monday, Harris visited FEMA headquarters and received a follow-up briefing on the effects of the hurricane.
The White House official said that Harris will go to North Carolina in the coming days. The White House also said Biden would travel to Georgia and Florida “as soon as possible.”
Trump visited Valdosta, Georgia on Monday falsely claimed that Georgia Governor Brian Kemp could not reach Biden. He also said in a taped interview before his trip to Georgia that the Biden-Harris administration is “doing everything they can to hurt” rural Trump voters by avoiding offering help to Republican districts in the state.
In response to Trump’s criticism and suggestions that the administration is not doing enough, the White House released detailed lists of steps the federal government is taking in each state to deal with the devastation.
“He’s lying,” Biden said Monday when asked to respond to Trump’s accusations of ignoring the disaster. “Let me get this straight: He’s lying and the governor told him he was lying. The governor told him he was lying.”
Biden said FEMA pre-positioned a lot of material from Florida to Tennessee ahead of the storm, so “the idea that we weren’t prepared — the question is, no one knew exactly how devastating it was going to be. We knew it was going to be significant, and we already have a lot, but more.” there is.”
Tara Prindiville contributed.