Migrants, FEMA and $750: How Trump and his allies are spreading false claims about Hurricane Helene relief

Donald Trump and his allies have spent the week in the aftermath of Hurricane Helene spreading false claims about the federal response to the devastation — misinformation that officials warn could be dangerous to survivors in need of aid.

As the death toll from Helene’s aftermath surpasses 200 and hundreds of thousands are still without power, the former president and those close to him have spent the week since the storm ripped through the southeastern part of the country spreading falsehoods about the response.

Sunday’s rally in Juneau, Wisconsin was no different. Trump baselessly claimed that as the flood waters were rising, President Joe Biden’s administration “was gone” and that survivors haven’t seen “anybody from the federal government yet.”

Not only have Biden and Kamala Harris have both paid visits to the areas wrecked by the Category 4 storm, there are also nearly 7,000 federal personnel on the ground in the affected region, according to a White House memo.

The Trump campaign, for its part, also partnered with a Christian humanitarian aid organization to supply fuel, food, water, and other resources to Georgia, a swing state.

Perhaps the most pervasive false statement is that the federal government is only providing $750 to disaster survivors.

Trump told a Butler, Pennsylvania crowd on Saturday that the administration is “offering them $750, to people whose homes have been washed away.”

“And yet we send tens of billions of dollars to foreign countries that most people have never heard of,” he said.

Meanwhile, his running mate JD Vance called it “insulting for people who have lost their homes and nearly everything to have somebody swoop in and talk about $750 like that’s a big sum of money.”

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