SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico -- Outside of official events, many Puerto Ricans say they won't be welcoming President Donald Trump with open arms during his visit to the storm-battered island today.
People in the U.S. territory were angry or dismissive Monday when asked about Trump's description of some Puerto Ricans as "ingrates" for criticizing the U.S. government's response after Hurricane Maria and his assurances that the relief effort is going well.
"He's a piece of trash," said Rachel Cruz, a linguist, who was heading home after buying groceries in the capital, San Juan. "He makes a fool out of himself and a fool out of his country."
Cruz said Puerto Ricans are furious with power still cut off on most of the island, with schools and many businesses closed, and with much of the countryside struggling to find fresh water and food, but she said even the angriest were unlikely to openly insult the man ultimately responsible for helping them.
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Photos by The Associated Press
Photos by The Associated Press
"The majority of people here feel that way, but we have to be more balanced because we need help," she said.
Even Puerto Ricans happy with the federal aid effort for the U.S. territory's 3.4 million people said they resented Trump's tweets about some Puerto Ricans being lazy and ungrateful.
"We appreciate all the help that we've received, but his comments are not true," said Nancy Rivera, a private school principal who was out buying bread. "We don't deserve that."
Rivera and her husband live in the north coastal town of Toa Baja, which was one of the hardest hit by Maria and where dozens of people had to be rescued from rooftops amid widespread flooding. The couple have moved temporarily to their son's apartment in San Juan.
Angel Tomas Crispin, manager of a convenience store that was doing brisk business as people sought to restock basic supplies, didn't have kind words for the president. "Donald Trump is not the solution for Puerto Rico," he said.
Crispin said he was angered by Trump's recent comments about the island. "All this money he has, and all the education he has, and he's ignorant," he said.
Noelys Martinez, a call-center worker, said she didn't think Trump's visit would change anything.
"The lights are not going to come back on because of him," she said as she strolled near a park, eating ice cream.
Luis Torres, a retiree taking an evening walk with his wife, Marina, said Trump isn't welcome.
"As far as I'm concerned, he shouldn't come," Torres said.
His wife nodded.
"He has expressed himself in such a disrespectful way. Extremely unnecessary and extremely insensitive," she said. "It's very sad."
Trump's comments against San Juan Mayor Carmen Yulin Cruz, whose criticism of the federal response to Maria sparked several of Trump's tweets, had added a new level of tension to his trip to the island.
Trump and his supporters have used social media to criticize Cruz, accusing her of launching politically motivated attacks against him.
"Most disaster victims aren't paying attention," said Michael Brown, the former director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency who was the subject of intense criticism for his handling of Hurricane Katrina's aftermath in 2005. "But those that do hear about it, it probably frustrates the hell out of them because they're like, 'Why are you fighting? Help us.'"
The president's comments turned the mayor of a city of less than 400,000 people into a nationally known figure and elevated her criticisms of his administration.
"Trump took the bait," said Barry Bennett, a former Trump campaign aide. "She wasn't a credible person at the beginning, but he probably made her more credible than she deserves."
In a Saturday morning tweet, Trump lambasted Cruz's "poor leadership" and accused her of failing to get Puerto Rican workers to help in their own recovery efforts.
In a subsequent message that did not name her, Trump slammed "politically motivated ingrates" who criticized the federal relief efforts.
Ahead of Trump's visit to the island, the White House seemed to be downplaying his criticism of Cruz, saying she had been invited to participate in the official visit.
"Look, right now our focus is to bring the mayor into the coordination efforts," said White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders. "This administration, as well as other members on the ground, have reached out to her.
"We hope that she will join with us in those efforts and be part of things," she added.
GOVERNOR CITES SUCCESSES
Unlike the Puerto Ricans criticizing Trump's comments and the federal response, Gov. Ricardo Rossello praised federal and state officials for the resources and help they have provided his island. He did note, however, that Puerto Rico has long been struggling because of its territorial status.
"I invite all of you to consider, to think of Puerto Ricans as your constituents," said Rossello, who supports statehood for the island. "Think about it as a moral imperative because we are U.S. citizens but more importantly, we're all equal as human beings."
The governor said water service has been restored to about 50 percent of customers across Puerto Rico. Rossello said he hopes 25 percent of electricity customers will have power by the end of October. Officials have said power would be restored to the entire island before March.
Rossello also announced that the wait time to buy gasoline had diminished from seven hours to one hour around San Juan in recent days and that nearly 40 percent of cellphone clients have service.
The head of FEMA, Brock Long, said Monday that a lot of good progress is being made. He flew to San Juan on Monday and traveled to a hard-hit area in the island's interior.
Long praised the efforts of more than 13,000 federal staff members in the stricken U.S. territory.
Still, 95 percent of electricity customers are without power, including some hospitals. Lt. Gen. Todd Semonite of the Army Corps of Engineers said it may take up to 10 months to restore service to some remote areas.
Long told reporters that he saw rush-hour traffic that included fuel and water trucks and workers cutting grass along roadways cleared of debris. He said many grocery stores and fast-food restaurants were open.
The car culture in Puerto Rico, which has one of the highest rates of car ownership in the world thanks to urban sprawl and the poor public transportation, is further complicating the struggle to restore people's lives and the commonwealth's economy.
Drivers desperate for gasoline are waiting hours in lines that stretch half a mile or more.
"It's ridiculous that there are so many cars on this little island," said Lisa Rivera, 54, who works for a company that runs Jenny Craig weight-loss programs. She spoke from her SUV as she sat in another line for gas.
Rossello has tried to tamp down panic by giving a running tally of how many of the island's 1,100 gas stations have reopened. At a news conference Monday morning, he put the number at 759.
HURRICANE-RELIEF FUNDS
In Washington, lawmakers were starting to plan how to pay for the recovery effort. Second-ranking Senate Republican John Cornyn said Monday that he expects Congress' next hurricane recovery bill will come later this month and will combine funds for victims of storms in Texas, Florida and Puerto Rico.
"I expect there will be one combination package that will involve Harvey, Irma and Maria," the powerful hurricanes that struck the Gulf Coast and Caribbean in quick succession, Cornyn, of Texas, told reporters.
He said officials may have a dollar figure for the Texas portion of the funding later this week. "But we're joining arms with everyone affected by the hurricanes. I think that's the right thing to do," Cornyn said.
Democratic Sen. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut said Monday that Congress should provide about $15 billion in initial aid for the crisis in Puerto Rico, and he accused the administration of treating the needs of island residents as less important than those of storm victims in Florida and Texas.
"There seems to be a double standard for disaster relief: one for the mainland and one for Puerto Rico," he said.
Blumenthal said FEMA and other agencies are working hard, but "what's required is leadership at the top, and that's what's been lacking."
Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts said thousands of people in Puerto Rico "have no food, no water, no power, no communications, and the [federal] government is not responding with the urgency that's needed."
Blumenthal and Warren were briefed by officials involved in the relief efforts.
Warren said the briefing "did not leave me feeling encouraged," in part because the administration didn't say how much funding would be needed to address the crisis. The White House is expected to issue an aid request later this month for Maria and the hurricanes that hit the U.S. mainland.
Later Monday, multiple people familiar with the White House's plans said the administration is preparing to ask for at least $10 billion more in federal relief.
The White House is expected to ask for another short-term infusion of cash to pay for the response to the damage caused by Hurricane Maria across Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands, according to top congressional aides. Some lawmakers are clamoring for legislation that would provide tens of billions of dollars in relief for the islands and address Puerto Rico's long-simmering fiscal crisis, shore up its bankrupt electric company and plug a shortfall in Medicaid funding. Work on a more comprehensive relief package will continue into the fall, the aides said.
"This is a disaster; this is something that calls for a plan. You can call it the Marshall Plan or the Trump Plan, but there has to be a plan," said Puerto Rico state Sen. Carmelo Rios. "There has to be a plan to make sure that this kind of event doesn't happen again."
Rios and other legislators from Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands arrived in Washington, D.C., on Monday for meetings with top agency officials and senior lawmakers about forthcoming relief plans. A planned event on Capitol Hill to draw attention to their campaign for a robust relief package was canceled because of the mass shooting in Las Vegas.
Rios, the Puerto Rican Senate's majority leader, warned that Congress should act quickly. If it doesn't, he expects more than 100,000 to 200,000 island residents to relocate, at least temporarily, to the mainland United States in the coming weeks.
"They're not going to Florida, only. They're going to Texas, to Pennsylvania, to North Carolina -- I have a lot of friends going there because they're looking for places where they can settle," Rios said.
In response to the impending influx of Puerto Ricans, Florida Gov. Rick Scott declared a state of emergency in all of the state's 67 counties on Monday so local and state agencies can begin preparing to provide services.
"With families displaced by Hurricane Maria already present and still arriving in Florida, it is critical that our state is prepared to provide the resources they need upon entering our state," Scott, a Republican, said in a statement.
Information for this article was contributed by Danica Coto and staff members of The Associated Press; by Abby Phillip, Ed O'Keefe, Kelsey Snell and Nick Miroff of The Washington Post; and by Jonathan Levin, Margaret Newkirk, Emma Ockerman, Jordyn Holman and Laura Litvan of Bloomberg News.
A Section on 10/03/2017