Vice President Kamala Harris has taken flak from Florida officials and commentators after inserting woke politics-based talking points into a discussion about Hurricane Ian relief.
“It is our lowest income communities and our communities of color that are most impacted by these extreme conditions and impacted by issues that are not of their own making,” Harris said, speaking at a Democratic National Committee Women’s Leadership Forum in Washington, DC on Friday.
“Women,” forum host Priyanka Chopra interjected. “Absolutely,” Harris said.
“And so we have to address this in a way that is about giving resources based on equity, understanding that we fight for equality but we also need to fight for equity, understanding that not everyone starts out at the same place. And if we want people to be in an equal place sometimes we have to take into account those disparities and do that work,” the vice president stressed.
Florida’s emergency response director Christina Pushaw, who also serves as an aide to governor RonDe Santis, slammed Harris over her comments, calling them “false” and accusing the vice president of fomenting “undue panic” and discrimination.
“[Federal Emergency Management Agency] Individual Assistance is already available to all Floridians impacted by Hurricane Ian, regardless of race or background,” Pushaw tweeted.
“I would be panicking if my relatives were in Fort Myers right now and the Vice President said that they wouldn’t be prioritized for FEMA assistance because they’re white. Fortunately, I know what is going on with the #HurricaneIan assistance and there is no racial discrimination,” she added in a follow-up tweet.
Pushaw later urged Harris to “correct what she said.”
Others piled onto Harris over her eyebrow-raising remarks, with Tesla and SpaceX chief Elon Musk suggesting aid should be distributed “according to greatest need, not race or anything else.”
Journalist Ian Miles Cheong accused Harris of out-and-out racism. “Just say it. Poor white people are screwed and Kamala Harris is gloating about it the same way she gloated about sending thousands of black men to prison over drug-related misdemeanors,” Cheong tweeted, referring to Harris’s hardline drug crime policy during her tenure as a prosecutor, district attorney and state attorney general in California.
The controversy over Harris’s remarks comes as southcentral Florida continues to dig out from the damage caused by Hurricane Ian, the worst tropical storm to hit the sunshine state since Hurricane Michael in 2018 by maximum sustained wind force, and one of the top worst tropical storms to hit the United States on record.
The cyclone ripped through western Cuba last Tuesday, and made landfall in Fort Myers, Florida on Wednesday afternoon before proceeding to the state’s northeast coast, striking South Carolina on Friday as a Category 1 hurricane before weakening into a “post-tropical cyclone” on its way inland.