Skip to content
Search AI Powered

Latest Stories

The Mayor of San Juan, PR Let Loose on Donald Trump in a Series of Tweets After He Falsely Accused Her of Mismanaging Relief Funds

The Mayor of San Juan, PR Let Loose on Donald Trump in a Series of Tweets After He Falsely Accused Her of Mismanaging Relief Funds
Mark Wilson/Getty Images // Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

Boom.

In a series of tweets, San Juan Mayor Carmen Yulin Cruz responded to President Donald Trump after he characterized her as "crazed," said that Puerto Rican politicians are “incompetent or corrupt” and falsely claimed that Puerto Rico has been “already been scheduled to receive more hurricane relief funding than any ‘place’ in history" following 2017's Hurricane Maria.

Cruz promised to call the president out on "every lie, every hypocrisy and every ill fated action against the people of Puerto Rico," adding that even his "insensitive, incapable, and vindictive" nature won't allow him to escape the death of 3,000 on his watch."


Cruz also took the president to task for his claim that Puerto Rico received $91 billion in hurricane relief.

This is false. In fact, a Washington Post report revealed that $11 billion has been sent to the island so far, far less than the $120 billion already spent in response to 2005’s Hurricane Katrina. The $91 billion sum Trump cites is an estimate of Puerto Rico’s recovery over the next few decades.

"FAKE NEWS!" Cruz wrote, employing the president's signature mantra against him. "Somebody save him from himself."

Cruz later stressed that 3,000 people lost their lives as a result of Hurricane Maria and the aftermath that has left many still living in weather-damaged housing and conditions that have hosted a rise in suicides and suicide attempts.

It was only a matter of time before Cruz spoke out and she was praised for doing so.

This isn't the first time that Cruz and Trump have sparred publicly.

In September 2018, Cruz criticized the president after he claimed his administration’s efforts in Puerto Rico “is one of the best jobs that has ever been done.”

“If he thinks the death of 3,000 people os [sic] a success God help us all,” Cruz said in part.

She added: “Can you imagine what he thinks failure looks like?”

Cruz's comments came after the release of a Government Accountability Office report that found no evidence of the fraud or misappropriation of resources that Trump or Gidley suggests took place. The agency actually slammed FEMA, which Trump has often praised.

“FEMA did not have enough bilingual employees to communicate with local residents or translate documents,” the GAO wrote, which “resulted in further delays while staff were reshuffled from other disasters to Puerto Rico.”

A George Washington University study published in August 2018 revised the island’s official death toll to 2,975 people, many of whom died due to lack of aid, electricity, water, and access to medical care. The Trump administration shuffled its feet in response to the disaster and was savaged for offering aid remarkably quickly to the victims of Hurricanes Harvey and Irma by comparison.

The president's personal response to the disaster has often been derided as callous and insensitive beginning from the moment he visited the island and was recorded tossing paper towels into a crowd of hurricane victims.

A POLITICO investigation found the Trump administration’s response to Hurricane Harvey was “faster and greater, at least initially” than its response to Hurricane Maria:

No two hurricanes are alike, and Harvey and Maria were vastly different storms that struck areas with vastly different financial, geographic and political situations. But a comparison of government statistics relating to the two recovery efforts strongly supports the views of disaster-recovery experts that FEMA and the Trump administration exerted a faster, and initially greater, effort in Texas, even though the damage in Puerto Rico exceeded that in Houston.

The Trump administration was also heavily criticized for its decision to make Puerto Rico go back to paying higher shipping costs to import supplies to hurricane-ravaged areas. Writing for The Huffington Post last year, Jennifer Bendery noted that:

The Jones Act requires that all goods shipped between U.S. ports be carried by U.S.-owned and operated ships, which are more expensive vessels than others in the global marketplace. That’s meant that Puerto Rico pays double the costs for goods from the U.S. mainland compared with neighboring islands ― and that U.S. vessels are making bank.

The Jones Act waiver for Puerto Rico expired on the night of October 8, 2017, meaning foreign ships could no longer bring aid to the island from U.S. ports. The Trump administration had no plans to extend it. The administration agreed to temporarily lift the shipping restrictions for Puerto Rico on September 28, 2017. That was substantially longer than it took for him to waive it for Florida and Texas shortly before.

The controversy was further exacerbated yesterday after White House Deputy Press Secretary Hogan Gidley in an interview with MSNBC twice referred to Puerto Rico as “that country” even though it’s been a U.S. territory for more than two centuries.

“With all they’ve done in that country, they’ve had a systematic mismanagement of the goods and services we’ve sent to them,” Gidley said in comments regarding the national response to Hurricane Maria in 2017. “You’ve seen food just rotting in the ports. Their governor has done a horrible job. He’s trying to make political hay in a political year, and he’s trying to find someone to take the blame off of his for not having a grid and not having a good system in that country at all.”

Gidley later attributed his misstatements to “a slip of the tongue."

More from People/donald-trump

Child covering their face
Photo by Caleb Woods on Unsplash

'Harmless' Lies People Tell Kids That Actually Have Long-Term Effects

From growing watermelons in your belly if you swallow watermelon seeds, to having to go to bed early so Santa Claus can visit on Christmas Eve, there are a lot of little lies that parents actually tell their kids.

But while they might think they're all harmless lies, some of them have long-lasting, and very negative, effects.

Keep ReadingShow less
Screenshots from @andydouglas.trumpboy's TikTok video; President Donald Trump
@andydouglas.trumpboy/TikTok; Andrew Harnik/Getty Images

Video Of Little Boy Sobbing After Finding Out Trump Is A Real Person Goes Viral—And We Totally Get It

Whether it was Santa Claus, the Tooth Fairy, or some other important facet of childhood, most of us found out when we were kids that something we loved did not exist, and it was absolutely devastating and world-changing.

But imagine there being something that you deeply disliked or feared, only for you to find out that it actually exists on the same plane and in the same timeline as you.

Keep ReadingShow less
Screenshots from @originalsugarphly's TikTok video
@originalsugarphly/TikTok

Woman Stunned After Best Friend Of 23 Years Ends Friendship Over Her 'Mom Shorts'

We will all have friends who come into our lives for a reason, for a season, or for a lifetime. There are those situational friendships, like from work or school, that dissolve when we exit that space, and there are friendships that might form from knowing the same people.

Then there are those tried-and-true friendships that we think will truly stand the test of time—but even those sometimes fracture under pressure. And sometimes for the most ridiculous reasons.

Keep ReadingShow less
Screenshots from @nurse_xtina129's TikTok
@nurse_xtina129/TikTok

Woman Sparks Debate By Putting Out Small Fire At Dunkin' Donuts After Workers Ignored It

Imagine hitting that afternoon slump and seeking out your favorite caffeinated beverage: a highlight in an otherwise dumpster fire kind of day. But then you arrive at your coffeehouse of choice—and there's literally a fire.

TikToker Cristina Conklin was waiting in line for a beverage at Dunkin' Donuts in Warwick, New York, when she became either a villain or a hero, depending on who was watching her TikTok video.

Keep ReadingShow less
Former Republican congressman and Fox News host Trey Gowdy
Roy Rochlin/Getty Images

MAGA Fumes Over Fox Gun Control Talk

The nation is reeling after yesterday’s mass shooting at Annunciation Church in Minneapolis, where a gunman opened fire during a Catholic school Mass, killing two children and injuring more than a dozen others. The tragedy has not only shaken the community but also reignited the national debate over guns in America—this time sparked by an unlikely voice.

Former Republican congressman and Fox News host of Sunday Night in America, Trey Gowdy—long seen as a staunch defender of gun rights and a past recipient of National Rifle Association contributions—surprised many of his own allies when he called for a national reckoning on firearms access.

Keep ReadingShow less