After several weeks of criticism over his administration's response to aiding Puerto Rico, President Trump tweeted that the federal relief efforts may soon end on the island.
After several weeks of criticism over his administration’s response to aiding Puerto Rico, President Trump tweeted that the federal relief efforts may soon end on the island.
(AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
AP Photo/Alex Brandon
FILE – In this Thursday, Sept. 28, 2017 file photo, destroyed communities are seen in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria in Toa Alta, Puerto Rico. The House is on track to backing President Donald Trump’s request for billions more in disaster aid, $16 billion to pay flood insurance claims and emergency funding to help the cash-strapped government of Puerto Rico stay afloat. The hurricane aid package Thursday, Oct. 12, 2017, totals $36.5 billion and sticks close to a White House request, ignoring – for now – huge demands from the powerful Florida and Texas delegations, who together pressed for some $40 billion more.
(AP Photo/Gerald Herbert, File)
AP Photo/Gerald Herbert, File
Efrain Diaz Figueroa, right, walks by his sister’s home destroyed in the passing of Hurricane Maria, in San Juan, Puerto Rico, Monday, Oct. 9, 2017. Maria sent tens of thousands of Puerto Ricans fleeing to the U.S. mainland to escape the immediate aftermath of the storm. The 70-year-old is waiting for a sister to come take him to stay with family in Boston. 鈥淚鈥檓 going to the U.S. I鈥檒l live better there,鈥� he said.
(AP Photo/Ramon Espinosa)
AP Photo/Ramon Espinosa
Efrain Diaz Figueroa spends the afternoon sitting on a chair next to the remains of the house of his sister destroyed by Hurricane Maria in San Juan, Puerto Rico, Monday, Oct. 9, 2017. Figueroa, who was visiting for a month at her sister Eneida’s house when the Hurricane Maria hit the area, also lost her home in the Arroyo community. He waits for a relative to come from Boston and take him to Boston. He says that he is 70 years old and all his life working can’t continue in these conditions in Puerto Rico.
(AP Photo/Ramon Espinosa)
AP Photo/Ramon Espinosa
In this Oct. 5, 2017 photo, a Puerto Rican national flag is mounted on debris of a damaged home in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria in the seaside slum La Perla, San Juan, Puerto Rico. With tourism to Puerto Rico as a whole abruptly halted, the only visitors to La Perla since the Sept. 20 storm have been people like the U.S. National Park Service workers who came to distribute bottles of water.
(AP Photo/Ramon Espinosa)
AP Photo/Ramon Espinosa
This Oct. 5, 2017 photo shows what is left of Roberto Figueroa’s home in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria in the seaside slum La Perla, San Juan, Puerto Rico. Tourism officials recently met with La Perla local leader and asked her how long it would take before La Perla could welcome tourists again. 鈥淲e told them to give us a month or two, that we were going to rise up again,鈥� Yashira Gomez said. 鈥淲e are looking for any kind of help … so that tourists can come back and see that La Perla is still pretty, that it鈥檚 on its feet and that we鈥檙e working hard to make it shine like before.鈥�
(AP Photo/Ramon Espinosa)
AP Photo/Ramon Espinosa
This Aug. 25, 2017 photo shows an aerial view of the seaside La Perla, in San Juan. Luis Fonsi and Daddy Yankee chose the slum as a backdrop for their “Despacito,” video. YouTube says a record 3 billion people have watched the images of La Perla’s bright homes perched on a small cliff overlooking the Atlantic’s deep blue waters.
(AP Photo/Ricardo Arduengo)
AP Photo/Ricardo Arduengo
In this Wednesday, Oct. 4, 2017 photo, workers repair research facilities destroyed by Hurricane Maria in Cayo Santiago, known as Monkey Island, in Puerto Rico, one of the world鈥檚 most important sites for research into how primates think, socialize and evolve. Mainland scientists are bringing in equipment from chain saws to a portable pier, funded by tens of thousands of dollars raised so far in university departments and online.
(AP Photo/Ramon Espinosa)
AP Photo/Ramon Espinosa
In this Oct. 3, 2017, photo, President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump walk after arrival at the Luis Mu帽iz Air National Guard Base in San Juan, Puerto Rico. According to a new poll by the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research, 48 percent of Americans approve and just 27 percent disapprove of how Trump is handling the recoveries in U.S. states including Texas and Florida that were hit by hurricanes Harvey and Irma. But just 32 percent approve of how Trump is handling disaster relief in Puerto Rico, while 49 percent disapprove.
(AP Photo/Ramon Espinosa)
WASHINGTON 鈥� President Donald Trump announced on Twitter that the federal government might soon be ending its recovery efforts in Puerto Rico as the island tries to recover from Hurricane Maria.
… We cannot keep FEMA, the Military & the First Responders, who have been amazing (under the most difficult circumstances) in P.R. forever!
鈥� Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump)
“We cannot keep FEMA, the Military (sic), & the First Responders, who have been amazing (under the most difficult circumstances) in P.R. forever!” Trump tweeted a little after 7 a.m.
The death toll on Puerto Rico has risen to for, according to Puerto Rico’s Department of Public Safety.
The Trump administration has been criticized for its slow response to the hurricane.
Trump has taken to Twitter before to , who was critical of Trump’s response to the devastation on the island, and on Sunday the head of FEMA dismissed the mayor’s complaints as “political noise.”
“We filtered out the mayor a long time ago,” said FEMA administrator Brock Long on “This Week” on Sunday. “We don’t have time for the political noise.”
