Harris promises continued federal support while visiting North Carolina to investigate Helene’s aftermath

CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) – Democratic presidential candidate Kamala Harris pledged continued federal support and praised the “heroes among us” as she visited North Carolina Saturday in the wake of Hurricane Helene, her second trip in four days to a disaster zone.

The vice president was in Charlotte a day after Republican Donald Trump, who has been spreading false claims about the federal response to the disaster, visited the state.

Harris began her visit by participating in a briefing with state and local officials, during which she thanked “those who are in the room and those who are currently out there working around the clock.”

She promised that federal aid would continue to flow and added praise for “strangers who help each other by providing people with shelter, food, friendship and community.”

Despite Trump’s claims that the federal response in the state has been “poor,” Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper said the state is “deeply grateful for the federal resources we have. FEMA has been with us from the very beginning,” he said, referring to the Federal Emergency Management Agency.

After the check-in, Harris helped pack cosmetics into medicine cabinets at the distribution center, where she met Angelika Wind of hard-hit Asheville, who came to volunteer with her daughter and a friend, even though Wind said her family still had no power and people “just… “They survived.”

“It shows a lot of resilience,” Wind told Harris, adding: “We want to make sure people don’t forget about us.”

Harris assured her that the federal government “will be here for the long haul.”

Melissa Funderbunk told Harris how she drove a truck to help people in remote Morganton “where people didn’t come.”

“You are heroes among us,” Harris said.

Earlier this week, Harris was in Georgia, where she helped distribute meals, toured the damage and comforted families hit hard by the storm. President Joe Biden also visited the disaster zone. During two days of stops in the Carolinas, Florida and Georgia, Biden surveyed the damage and met with farmers whose crops were destroyed.

They have both been loud and clear about the government’s desire to help, and the administration’s efforts so far include covering the costs of all rescue and reconstruction efforts in the Southeast for several months while states grapple with the brunt of mass destruction.

In a letter to congressional leaders on Friday, Biden wrote that while FEMA’s disaster relief fund “has the resources it needs right now to meet the most urgent needs, the fund will indeed face shortfalls by the end of the year.” He also called on lawmakers to act quickly to restore funding for the Small Business Administration’s Disaster Loan Program.

Over 200 people died. It is the worst storm to hit the US continent since Katrina in 2005, and scientists warn that such storms will only get worse in the face of climate change.

But in this overheated election year, even natural disasters have become deeply politicized as candidates traverse the disaster area and, in some cases, visit the same places to woo voters in battleground states.

Trump falsely claimed that the Biden administration was not doing enough to help residents of hard-hit Republican areas and sharply criticized the response. In the aftermath, Helene espoused lies about climate change, calling it “one of the greatest hoaxes of all time.”

At a Saturday rally in Butler, Pennsylvania, Trump renewed his complaints that the federal government was “doing a very bad job” in responding to the storm, which particularly provided little relief in North Carolina. In fact, Cooper said this week that more than 50,000 people have registered for FEMA aid and about $6 million has been paid out.

Biden suggested that House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-LA, withhold disaster relief money.

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Long reported from Washington. Associated Press writers Makiya Seminer in Boone, North Carolina, and Meg Kinnard in Fayetteville, North Carolina, contributed to this report.