Hurricane Idalia made landfall in Florida this week, devastating the state, and now Floridians are dealing with its aftermath. As the federal government and the state of Florida move towards recovery efforts, Florida Senator Marco Rubio (R) is calling into question the Biden administration’s efforts. Sharing his thoughts on the recovery effort, Rubio questioned the Biden administration’s plan to pair disaster relief with Ukraine funding.
During an interview with Fox News, Senator Rubio commented on Hurricane Idalia and the Biden Administration’s response.
“We would hope that hurricane recovery and things of this nature continue to be one of the few things that’s left out there that’s nonpartisan and nonpolitical, so I’m encouraged that the president has continued that tradition at least in his response,” he said, pointing out “a more fundamental problem,” which lies in the disaster relief fund from FEMA being “woefully low.”
“We knew that back in June. Since June, I’ve been trying to get money into it, knowing we’re going into hurricane season, and not knowing that we were gonna have fires in Maui and so forth,” Rubio argued, adding that “they don’t have enough money to do any of this, and moving forward, especially as we get into recovery, when you add in this storm, and you add in the fires in Maui,” the government’s response to these natural disasters is crucial.
However, the White House has expressed its intention to provide disaster relief, but Senator Rubio is calling into question Biden’s plans.
“They’ve been saying we’ll do disaster relief, but we’re going to pair it up with Ukraine funding,” Rubio explained. He further expressed that funding for disaster relief and funding for Ukraine “should never be one for the other.”
Calling the plan “nefarious,” Rubio suggested that “the White House backs off of that position.”
