WASHINGTON (AP) — Over the last four years, President Joe Biden has jetted off to survey damage and console victims after tornadoes, wildfires and tropical storms. It’s not a role that Kamala Harris has played as vice president.
Over the last four years, President Joe Biden has jetted off to survey damage and console victims after tornadoes, wildfires and tropical storms. It’s not a role that Kamala Harris has played as vice president.
But on Wednesday, they will both fan out across the Southeast to grapple with the damage from Hurricane Helene, seeking to demonstrate commitment and competence in helping devastated communities after Donald Trump’s false attacks on their administration’s response. Biden is heading to North and South Carolina, while Harris is going to Georgia.
Harris’ stop will also serve as a political test in the midst of a humanitarian crisis. She’s trying to step into the role for which Biden is best known — showing the empathy that Americans expect in times of tragedy — in the closing stretch of her campaign for president.
She last visited scenes of natural disasters as a U.S. senator from California, including when she went to Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria in 2017 and when she walked through charred wreckage in Paradise, California, after the Camp Fire in 2018.
