Opinion: Trump’s new Puerto Rico hate-tweets rest on a very ugly premise
By Greg Sargent Greg Sargent Opinion writer covering national politics Email Bio Follow Opinion writer April 2 at 10:41 AM President Trump wants Midwestern farmers to believe that Puerto Rico, with the complicity of Democrats, is trying to take their disaster relief money from them — and that the island is undeserving of any further financial help.
A battle has erupted in the Senate over disaster relief, one that, if Trump has his way, will pit more recent disaster victims against those on Puerto Rico who are still suffering under the aftereffects of the 2017 Hurricane Maria. Crucially, Trump also argued that Puerto Rico politicians “only take from USA” and that Democrats now “want to give them more, taking dollars away from our Farmers.”
As Erica Werner and Jeff Stein explain, what actually happened is that House Democrats passed a relief bill with money for Puerto Rico and other more recent disasters months ago — well before the Midwestern flooding occurred. So Senate Democrats on Monday tried to add an amendment to that bill that would make billions in disaster money accessible to the Midwest and Southeast. Thus, the Democratic approach was to fund Midwestern, Southern and Puerto Rican aid.
Multiple Republicans have made versions of this argument. And Trump did, too, bashing Democrats for killing “great relief to Farmers.”But the core dispute is not over whether Midwestern disaster relief should be funded, or by how much. It’s over whether more money should be added to help Puerto Rico. And even if more were added for Puerto Rico, as Democrats want, it would not come out of funding for Midwestern relief.
It should be noted that Puerto Rico is still in desperate straits. Recently New York Times reporters visited more than 150 homes in Puerto Rico and came away with numerous wrenching stories.
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