Chloe Villa-Abrille | The United States Response to Hurricane Maria

Source: http://www.cnn.com/2017/09/25/politics/puerto-rico-hurricane-maria-aid-donald-trump/index.html

Recently Puerto Rico has been hit with the devastating Hurricane Maria. In response, Homeland security adviser, Marine Corps for assistance, Tom Bossert, and Brock Long, Federal Emergency Management Agency administrator have made some efforts to aid the disaster. Though, the president has made few efforts to help and has disregarded the situation. At the moment a disaster relief request is in the works and will soon be worked through Congress. Hopefully this relief program will be passed and with the FEMA’s $5.03 billion available spending, another $6.7 billion can be added through the request. Sahrah Sander comments on the White Houses actions as, “anything but slow” and “too early to decide on an amount to spend for repairs.” While Puerto Rico’s Governor, Ricardo Russello points out this could become a humanitarian crisis and needs aid as quickly as possible before things become dire, not to mention Puerto Rico is part of the United States and as a should be given aid just like any other region of the US would. At the moment the already impoverished island is now with out basic necessities, power, and any mean of communication causing aid the come at a slower rate, to rebuild Puerto Rico aid from others will be needed.

Written by Deirdre Walsh and Kevin Liptak for CNN, this report was meant to inform the general public over the devastating Hurricane Maria that hit Puerto Rico. It also gave a look into US action for this situation, and the matter seems to be being dealt with quickly with fundraising and request being made to aid the island, but the sad fact is that the president is giving this situation no mind, he chooses to disregard the situation and hasn’t spoken about it, but when the previous two hurricanes hit, he chose to visit and support those who had been caught in the event. Puerto Rico is part of the US and should be treated like it, while Puetorican citizens can risk their lives and fight in the war for the US, they still are denied the right to vote or represent themselves. Puerto Rico was already in a bad state to begin with, and now it’s become even worse, hopefully with the aid from other the small island can rebuild themselves.