Vice President Kamala Harris was criticized for a post on Saturday announcing the United States would “provide nearly $157 million in additional assistance to the people of Lebanon.”
In a post on X, Harris said the $157 million in aid to people in Lebanon would be for “essential needs such as food, shelter, water, protection, and sanitation.” Harris’s post came a day after U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken declared that the U.S. would provide people in Lebanon with almost $157 million in aid.
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IDF“The people of Lebanon are facing an increasingly dire humanitarian situation,” Harris wrote in her post. “I am concerned about the security and well-being of civilians suffering in Lebanon and will continue working to help meet the needs of all civilians there.”
Harris continued:
To that end, the United States will provide nearly $157 million in additional assistance to the people of Lebanon for essential needs such as food, shelter, water, protection, and sanitation to help those who have been displaced by the recent conflict. This additional support brings total U.S. assistance to Lebanon over the last year to over $385 million.
People took to social media to criticize Harris’s tone-deaf post as people in western North Carolina, and other communities are still dealing with the damage from Hurricane Helene.
“It’s almost impossible to take this comment as anything other than an intentional act of publicly broadcast hatred and derision for Americans in Appalachia right now,” William Wolfe, the Executive Director for the Center for Baptist Leadership wrote in a post on X.
“Kamala is touting giving money to the people of Lebanon — while stiff-arming the humanitarian crisis in North Carolina,” Texas Gov. Greg Abbott (R) wrote in a post on X. “This is Kamala’s Katrina.”
“Read the room Madam Vice President,” Rep. Tim Burchett (R-TN) wrote in a post on X. “Americans are in need and we should take care of our own first.”
“Please tell me there is a town called Lebanon, North Carolina?” Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) asked in a post.
“If we renamed Florida and North Carolina to Lebanon and Ukraine, maybe Kamala Harris would send disaster relief faster,” Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL) wrote. “She’s made it clear that being Americans puts us last in line.”
The statements from Harris and Blinken announcing millions of dollars in humanitarian aid for people in Lebanon who have been affected by the fighting between Israel and Hezbollah comes as people in the city of Asheville, North Carolina; the village of Chimney Rock, North Carolina, and other communities have been affected by heavy rainfall and flooding from the hurricane.
Other communities in Georgia, southwestern Virginia, and eastern Tennessee were also left affected by Hurricane Helene as they faced power outages, landslides in the mountains, massive flooding, and roads being wiped out.
On October 4, the Federal Emergency Management Administration (FEMA) revealed it had provided more than $45 million to assist in Hurricane Helene relief efforts. Out of this amount, more than $17 million went to people in North Carolina, over $23 million has gone to people in Florida, $4.5 million has gone to people in South Carolina, and “more than $124,000 to survivors” in Virginia.
The post from Harris comes after Samantha Power, who serves as the administrator for the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), posted a video talking about how with “support” from Americans, her agency was “working with Ukrainians to keep the lights on and the heat going.”
