Former President Donald Trump will visit Valdosta, Georgia, on Monday afternoon after the city got ravaged by Hurricane Helene as the death toll from the storm nears 100 people across the southeast.
Trump will receive a briefing on storm relief efforts, hand out emergency supplies, and speak to reporters in Valdosta around 2:00 p.m. local time. The visit comes after Trump criticized Vice President Kamala Harris for fundraising over the weekend instead of going to parts of the country impacted by the storm.
In a visit to Valdosta over the weekend, Georgia Republican Governor Brian Kemp called the damage in Valdosta “unprecedented.”
“It looks like a tornado went off. It looks like a bomb went off, and it’s not just here. It looks like that from all the way to Augusta,” he said.
Helene, initially a Category 4 hurricane, brought powerful wind and torrential rain to the southeast causing at least 91 deaths across Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, South Carolina and Virginia. Those states, as well as Alabama, have all had emergency declarations approved by President Joe Biden.
Many areas were left without power and had no access to food and water as the rain caused devastating flooding leaving hundreds of people trapped. The city of Asheville, North Carolina, and its surrounding communities were hit particularly hard by the storm, with 30 deaths already reported. FEMA Administrator Deanne Criswell is expected to visit North Carolina on Monday to survey the damage.
The North Carolina National Guard said Sunday that it had already distributed more than 34,000 pounds of cargo of food, water, and medical supplies to the western areas of the state hit hard by the storm. It said its relief efforts had been assisted by personnel and resources from Connecticut, Maryland, Ohio, Iowa, Florida, South Carolina, and Pennsylvania.
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During a speech in Pennsylvania on Sunday, Trump said that Harris should have visited areas hit by the storm instead of attending “fundraising events with her radical Left, lunatic donors.”
“Why is Lyin’ Kamala Harris in San Francisco, a City that she has totally destroyed, at fundraising events, when big parts of our Country are devastated and under water – with many people dead? She is openly acknowledged to be the Worst Vice President in History and, as President, she would be even WORSE!” Trump posted on Truth Social.
Late Sunday night, the White House announced that Harris would visit areas impacted by Hurricane Helene “as soon as it is possible without disrupting emergency response operations.”