Community leaders: Recovery efforts still needed in Puerto Rico

The parties are courting Puerto Rican voters who are longtime residents of Florida, as well as those who relocated to the state after Maria caused devastating damage to the USA territory last September.

Trump recently went on another Twitter rampage, this time lying about his recovery efforts for Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria and Irma. “Then, a long time later, they started to report really large numbers, like 3000…” he said, apparently in reference to the official tolls that came out months after the storm.

The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) says it has spent billions of dollars in Puerto Rico, restoring power and helping with property repairs and a massive cleanup. “I don’t think it’s bad to say we could have done better in Puerto Rico”.

Governor Ricardo Rosselló also responded to the tweets, telling CNN “there is no reason to doubt the validity of these studies, there is no reason to expect that, even though it is an estimate, that it’s not far away from the accurate toll should be”.

Throughout his presidency, Trump has struggled to publicly express empathy at times of national crises, sparking outrage during his post-Maria visit when he feuded with San Juan Mayor Carmen Yulin Cruz and tossed out paper towels to victims like he was shooting baskets.

As the United States braces itself for Hurricane Florence, it seems Trump is still determined to make people believe he did a great job during Hurricane Maria.

“We stand by the science underlying our study”, the statement said.

However Trump implied the death toll was revised for political reasons.

The Comedy Central star thought this conflict between Trump and a death toll study was “inevitable”.

With all attention on Hurricane Florence, Republicans are dealing with a separate, familiar kind of storm in the halls of Congress – one of the president’s own making.

Trump reignited the controversy around the USA government’s management of the disaster when he said Tuesday it was an “incredible, unsung success”.

In December 2017-three months after Hurricane Maria devasted Puerto Rico-Puerto Rican officials reported that 64 people had died on the island as a result of Maria.

Maria devastated the island in September 2017 and knocked out the entire electricity grid.

FEMA officials confirmed that the agency’s efforts to deploy more resources early are intentional, noting that increased pre-storm preparation were among the agency’s recommendations in its assessment of its performance during hurricane season a year ago.

Cora, who was born in Puerto Rico, took issue with those comments.

Since the primary election, her life has been a whirlwind, with the highs and lows that one might expect for a person entering politics so suddenly. “Don’t play games with it, it’s a big one”, Trump warned Americans.