Trump’s Texas visit highlights an us-vs-them approach to disasters

By James Oliphant and Helen Coster

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -In the days since flash flooding killed at least 120 people in Texas, President Donald Trump has pledged unwavering support for the deep-red state, lauding Republican Governor Greg Abbott and other local officials for their “incredible” response to the July 4 disaster.

That praise, which Trump is likely to repeat during his visit to the flood-ravaged Texas Hill Country on Friday, is a far cry from Trump’s harsh criticism of elected Democrats in California when wildfires devastated Los Angeles in January.

While the fires were burning, he accused Democratic Governor Gavin Newsom and Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass of “gross incompetence.” Months later, left-leaning California is seeking more federal dollars to help recover from the catastrophe.

The Republican-led Congress has yet to release $40 billion in federal disaster recovery aid that Newsom requested in February. That said, the Trump administration has given disaster survivors more than $2 billion in FEMA grants and federal loan assistance and paid $2 billion for debris clearance.

During his time as president, as well as when he was a candidate, Trump has cast disaster response in us-versus-them terms more often than any other president in recent times, highlighting his allies’ efforts while criticizing opponents, experts say.

“Trump is unusually political,” said Claire Rubin, an independent researcher and consultant in emergency management. “The contrast in treatment in California and Texas might be the most glaring example of how these events are politicized.”

In response to such criticism, the White House said Trump treats all states the same regardless of political leanings.

“President Trump has led historic disaster recovery efforts in both California and North Carolina – he’s doing the same in Texas,” said White House spokeswoman Abigail Jackson. “Any claim that the president is giving certain states preferential treatment is not only wrong, it’s idiotic and misinformed.”

After torrential rains on Friday, floodwaters in the Texas Hill Country have killed at least 120 people, including 36 children in Kerr County, while 170 people are missing.

The Trump administration has rushed to help, while rebuffing suggestions that budget cuts to the national weather warning system and the Federal Emergency Management Agency may have made a bad situation worse.

When the Senate’s top Democrat, Chuck Schumer, called for an investigation into whether staffing levels at the National Weather Service played a role in the disaster, the White House accused Democrats of politicizing the tragedy. Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said assigning any blame to Trump would be “depraved.”

“The response has been incredible,” Trump said at a cabinet meeting on Tuesday. “And the fact that we got along so well. I don’t even think that’s a political thing, but we got along so well and it was so unified.”

Trump has not always sought unity.

In January, he called California’s Democratic officials “incompetent pols” who “have no idea” how to put out the fires.

Local officials disputed Trump’s claims that Newsom refused to provide water from the northern part of the state to fight the fires. Some hydrants in the Los Angeles area ran dry during the wildfires, but local officials said that was because they were not designed to deal with such a massive disaster.

TEXAS TO GET ‘ANYTHING’ IT NEEDS

Days after the flood, Trump signed a disaster aid declaration for the state. U.S. Senator Ted Cruz of Texas said Trump told him in a phone call that his state would get “anything” it needs. It is too early to know how much federal assistance will eventually go to Texas.

In September, when Hurricane Helene battered the U.S. Southeast – including the political battleground states of North Carolina and Georgia – Trump was weeks away from facing Vice President and Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris in what polls were showing to be a close election.

During a visit to storm-damaged Valdosta, Georgia – a state led by Republican Governor Brian Kemp – Trump suggested that Democratic President Joe Biden had been unresponsive to the hurricane’s destruction, saying that Kemp “was having a hard time” getting Biden on the phone.

Kemp told reporters that Biden had called him the evening before and the governor said he was grateful for the federal assistance Biden had offered.

While Trump was effusive in his praise for Kemp, he claimed the Biden administration’s response to the disaster had been “terrible.” Trump also alleged that federal relief money was being used to house migrants living in the U.S. illegally. He also accused North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper, a Democrat, of blocking relief money to the Republican areas of the state.

While Trump made those remarks in the heat of a presidential campaign, he was similarly hostile toward the government of Democratic-leaning Puerto Rico after a hurricane in 2017 wiped out power on the island and killed nearly 3,000 people. Trump, who was then in his first term as president, repeatedly clashed with local officials, blaming them for the slow recovery and claiming they were overly reliant on federal aid.

“They want everything to be done for them when it should be a community effort,” Trump said at the time.

Trump’s conduct stands in contrast with that of former presidents, said North Carolina State University political scientist Thomas Birkland. Barack Obama, a Democrat, famously toured the damage from Super Storm Sandy in 2012 alongside Republican Governor Chris Christie of New Jersey. Christie praised Obama’s handling of the disaster, which earned him scorn from his fellow Republicans.

Daniel Aldrich, who studies disasters and their aftermath at Northeastern University, said establishing trust between disaster victims and the government is key to recovery. Criticism and misinformation, he said, undermine that trust, and could result in victims spurning government aid or a drop in private donations to relief groups.

“Trust is the engine of mitigation and trust is the engine of recovery,” Aldrich said. “Every time a sitting president or governor or mayor undermines trust in each other or in the government, we are damaging the nation’s ability to be resilient.”

(Reporting by James Oliphant in Washington and Helen Coster in New York; Editing by Frank McGurty and Diane Craft)