Harris to tour Helene damage in North Carolina on Saturday

Vice President Harris will travel Saturday to North Carolina to tour the damage from Hurricane Helene and get an update on the ongoing recovery efforts in the state.

Harris, who is the Democratic nominee for president, will get a briefing from local officials and will speak about how the federal government is working to support the on-the-ground response in North Carolina and other states impacted by the storm.

The vice president visited Georgia on Wednesday to meet with families impacted by Hurricane Helene and survey damage. President Biden spent Wednesday in North Carolina and visited Florida and Georgia on Thursday.

The Biden administration has deployed more than 4,800 federal officials to support response efforts, and the president directed the deployment of up to 1,000 troops to assist in North Carolina’s recovery.

The federal government has also been working with states to provide housing assistance for those who need it and to restore power amid widespread outages. Biden has approved major disaster declarations for Georgia, Florida, North Carolina, South Carolina and Virginia to free up additional resources.

Former President Trump has in recent days used the hurricane response as a line of political attack. He falsely claimed during a Monday visit to Georgia that Gov. Brian Kemp (R) had been unable to reach Biden on the phone, and on Thursday Trump called the federal response “the worst response in the history of hurricanes.”

Hurricane Helene tore through Florida, Georgia, South Carolina and North Carolina, killing more than 200 people across multiple states. It is the deadliest storm since Hurricane Katrina, which caused nearly 1,400 fatalities.