Puerto Rico Governor backs Trump’s campaign

WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW:

• Puerto Rico Governor Wanda Vázquez Garced on Tuesday announced her support for President Donald Trump’s reelection bid and asked her constituents to vote for him.
• Vázquez Garced repeatedly showed her affiliation with Trump, anticipating a relief aid following Hurricane Katrina’s destruction to Puerto Rico.
• Presidential rival Joe Biden’s camp said that Trump’s delayed relief aid was “a desperate, political stunt to win over Puerto Rican supporters.”

On Tuesday, Puerto Rico Governor Wanda Vázquez Garced (R) endorsed President Donald Trump and urged Puerto Ricans to reelect him on November 3rd.

“I ask all Puerto Ricans who are listening to go vote,” Vázquez Garced told Telemundo. “They have to go to vote, exercise their right to vote, and evaluate who has represented being a person who thinks about Puerto Ricans and their needs at the most difficult moment. It is Donald Trump.”

Last Friday, the Puerto Rican governor was scheduled to attend Trump’s campaign event in central Florida, saying that she was invited to travel on Air Force One and host a meeting in Puerto Rico, Puerto Rican newspaper El Nuevo Día reported.

The event, however, was canceled after Trump tested positive for COVID-19.

When asked about Trump’s act of throwing paper towels to Puerto Ricans during a 2017 visit following the catastrophe from Hurricane Maria, Vázquez Garced said that voters should not focus on that effort, since “nobody is perfect.”

Vázquez Garced has continuously made known in public her affinity with the US president as she suggested during a February rally that Trump may not otherwise provide federal aid to her state.

The Trump administration said last month that it would give another $13 billion relief to Puerto Rico to help it cope with redeveloping its infrastructure that was devastated by the hurricane back in 2017.

Trump attributed the almost three-year turnover of the aid to the Democrats and some pertinent works, although the funds were already disbursed to the Federal Emergency Management Agency, an implication that the White House could already allocate the funds months prior to its disbursement.

Earlier this year, the Department of Housing and Urban Development in a separate move lifted a months-long hold of about $8 billion disaster aid aimed at rebuilding the island.

In a statement released on Tuesday, the Republican National Committee said that “Vázquez Garced’s endorsement is further proof of the enthusiasm” that Trump has generated among the Hispanic people.

Democratic nominee Joe Biden’s camp, though, said that the late relief aid was “a desperate, political stunt to win over Puerto Rican supporters.”

“For the thousands of families who had to leave the island, for all those we’ve lost, for those who still struggle every day to keep a roof over their heads and food on the table, it is three years too little and too late,” Tatiana Matta, Biden’s Latino adviser, said in a statement in reaction to Vázquez Garced’s endorsement.

Florida, a key battleground state, is currently resided by a million Puerto Ricans.

Source: The Hill