“I think the fundamental mistake that Kamala Harris’ administration has made here, Will, is that from the get-go, you should have imposed military-style command and control,” Vance told “Fox & Friends.” “You’ve got eight different bureaucratic organizations, you’ve got a lot of different bureaucratic fiefdoms that sometimes delay the provision of necessary resources, you need to empower a military commander on the ground to get helicopters to where they need to go, to get supplies … to cut through some of the FAA bureaucracy.”
“The problem here, I really believe, it’s like the DMV at industrial scale, and because of it, a lot of folks in North Carolina are suffering unnecessarily,” he noted further. “I hope to God you don’t have an unnecessary loss of life, but I fear that we do, and it all goes back to why we have a president and a vice president, one of whom is on the beach, the other of whom is participating in fundraisers rather than doing their job. It is incompetence of the highest order.”
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Vance addressed the assertion that there is a pool of funds within FEMA designated for illegal immigrants, distinct from another set of funds allocated to American citizens.
“I think that misses the fundamental point that the Biden-Harris administration has turned FEMA effectively into an agency that helps to resettle and helps to deal with illegal immigration,” he said. “That is just fundamentally going to distract focus from their core job of helping American citizens in their time of need.”
Continuing, Vance called the administration’s response following Hurricane Helene a “complete failure of leadership,” demonstrated by the contrast in previous responses to natural disasters.
“In 2010, there was a terrible earthquake in Port-au-Prince, Haiti,” he explained. “The 82nd Airborne was on the ground two days later. There was a disastrous hurricane an hour away from the 82nd Airborne headquarters. It took more than a week for the full deployment to arrive and start helping people out.”
“It’s a complete lack of leadership,” he added. “When things like this happen, you need somebody in charge, you need somebody saying we’re going to save as many lives as possible. Red tape be damned. Unfortunately, what you’ve had is somebody asleep at the wheel. Nobody knows who’s in charge and I think it has delayed the provision of necessary resources to the people of North Carolina.”
Vance claimed that for 40 years, American leadership has ignored the Appalachian region of the nation.
“They really feel ignored today,” he said. “The way you solve that problem is by having leaders who show up and focus on the people. Kamala Harris has failed to do that.”
Though the responses to Helene have been dicey at best according to several people who have been affected, the Biden-Harris administration has had time to set up a “fact-check” page on the FEMA website to address alleged false claims.
“One response tackles the allegation that funding intended for disaster relief has been redirected to support international efforts or border issues,” Fox News noted.
“No money is being diverted from disaster response needs,” the site claimed. “FEMA’s disaster response efforts and individual assistance is funded through the Disaster Relief Fund, which is a dedicated fund for disaster efforts. Disaster Relief Fund money has not been diverted to other, non-disaster related efforts.”
