Vice President Kamala Harris criticized former President Donald Trump on Monday false claims He talked about disaster relief Victims of Hurricane Helene.
Harris told reporters that there was “a lot of misinformation out there from the former president, especially about what was available to the survivors of Helene” from the Federal Emergency Management Agency.
“It’s incredibly irresponsible. It’s about him; it’s not about you,” Harris said. “And the reality is that FEMA now has a lot of resources available to people who need them most, and resources to help people get up and rebuild and have places to go.”
A spokesman for the Trump campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment Monday night.
Trump last week strengthened the false claim About FEMA’s disaster funds, he said, they are distributed to migrants who entered the United States illegally.
“They stole FEMA money like they stole it from a bank so they could give it to illegal immigrants they want to vote for this season,” Trump said at a rally in Saginaw, Michigan.
NBC News there is informed Trump and his allies said they were combining more than $20 billion in funds earmarked for disaster relief alone and a separate program created under congressional guidance in 2022 to allocate funds from Customs and Border Protection to help US communities serve migrants released by the Department. Homeland Security.
FEMA also responded, saying its emergency response money “is not diverted to other, non-disaster-related efforts.”
Trump spread false claims The agency said at a rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, that the federal government is giving disaster victims a total of $750. FEMA argueddescribes the initial amount as a payment to help cover basic needs and emergency supplies while survivors are considered eligible for more funds.
FEMA Administrator Deanne Criswell called Trump’s comments “simply false” and “a really dangerous narrative” in an interview on Sunday. ABC News.
“It’s a real shame that we put politics before helping people, and that’s what we’re here to do,” Criswell said.
The hurricane, which hit Florida on September 26, was the deadliest on record since Hurricane Katrina in 2005, with the death toll rising to 230.