Biden Rebuffs Claims Against Florida Governor

 

President Joe Biden said on Tuesday that Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis has been “cooperative” with the federal government ahead of Hurricane Milton’s landfall on Wednesday.

The comment follows Vice President Kamala Harris’s accusation that DeSantis did not answer her phone call ahead of the hurricane.

Biden said that DeSantis, a Republican, “has been cooperative” and has “gotten all that he needs” from the White House.

“I literally gave him my personal phone number to call,” Biden added, referring to DeSantis. “So I don’t know—there was a rough start in some places, but every governor, every governor from Florida to North Carolina, has been fully cooperative and supportive and acknowledged what this team is doing.”

Biden also warned that Milton “could be the worst storm to hit Florida in over a century” as the now Category 5 storm heads across the Gulf of Mexico.

On Monday, Harris told reporters that DeSantis was being “utterly irresponsible” by not speaking with her in the aftermath of Hurricane Helene, which made landfall in Florida last month.

“Moments of crisis, if nothing else, should really be the moment that anyone who calls themselves a leader says they’re going to put politics aside and put the people first,” Harris said of DeSantis.

In response, DeSantis said that he was unaware that Harris attempted to contact him.

“I saw the news report—I didn’t know she tried to contact me. ... My focus is exactly where it should be,” DeSantis told “Fox & Friends” on Tuesday.

“I’ve worked on these hurricanes under both President [Donald] Trump and President Biden. Neither of them ever tried to politicize it. She has never called on any of the storms we’ve had since she’s been vice president until apparently now,“ the governor said, adding that the vice president isn’t ”in the chain of command” for storm assistance.

The governor, meanwhile, said that the federal government has provided all the resources he has needed to deal with the storm.

“All of our requests have been answered,” he told Fox. “We have marshaled all state resources that are available to us. It’s going to be a very robust response, but it’s going to be a lot of damage, and we’re bracing for that.”