President Joe Biden on Tuesday praised Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis for his efforts to get the state ready for a strike in the Tampa Bay area by Hurricane Milton.
“The governor of Florida says he’s gotten all that he needs,” Biden said. “I talked again to him yesterday and I said no, you’re doing a great job, we thank you for it and I literally gave my personal phone number to call.
“There was a rough start in some places, but every governor from Florida to North Carolina has been fully cooperative and supportive and acknowledged what this team is doing and they’re doing an incredible job, but we’ve got a lot more to do.”
The praise from Biden comes as DeSantis and Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic nominee, continue to be at odds. Harris called him “selfish” for not taking her calls and DeSantis shot back, saying she was trying to “parachute” her way into storm recovery and relief efforts.
Biden also said in a briefing at the White House that his administration would help “communities before, during and after these extreme weather events.”
The federal government’s response to Helene has been under fire from former President Donald Trump, the 2024 Republican nominee.
“They’re offering $750 to people whose homes have been washed away, and yet we send tens of billions of dollars to foreign countries that most people have never heard of,” Trump said at his Butler, Pa. rally Saturday.
His comment was without context. The Biden administration has confirmed more than $137 million in assistance with more expected, and North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper said more than $33 million in FEMA assistances to individuals had already been paid to more than 109,000 people. More than 2,100 are housed in hotels through FEMA transitional sheltering.
Hurricane Milton, likely one of the worst storms in 100 years in Tampa, is predicted to make landfall late Wednesday or early Thursday morning as a Category 3 storm packing winds of 120 mph.
It’ll be the second storm in as many weeks to hit the state and DeSantis urged Floridians in a news conference in Ocala on Tuesday to not lose faith in the state’s ability to bounce back.
“It’s not easy,” he said. “I know people have been working around the clock, not just with state government, but our local counties and cities and then all the other partners that participate in this. But people are pushing forward. They’re stepping up. I know some of our residents that just experienced hurricane damage from Helene are also fatigued. Just hang in there and do the right thing. Just let’s get through this. We can do it together.
“And then on the other side of it, make sure everybody’s safe and and we’ll put the pieces back together. The state is strong, we’re going to be able to weather it. Not going to be easy. We’re going to suffer damage.”
The storm surge in Tampa Bay, which hasn’t been hit directly by a hurricane since 1921, could be as high as 15 feet. That’s triple what the area experienced with Hurricane Helene, which passed offshore on Sept. 23 before making landfall in the Big Bend region of Florida.
Helene’s biggest impact has been in western North Carolina and eastern Tennessee, where flash flooding destroyed communities and killed 230, including 84 in North Carolina.
