Republican Senator Gives Shocking Defense of GOP’s Hurricane Lies

Amid active devastation in the American South wrought by unprecedented hurricanes, Republicans are busy with one thing: attacking Vice President Kamala Harris for dismantling their weather-related conspiracies.

Speaking with Fox News on Wednesday, Missouri Senator Eric Schmitt seemingly torched Harris for actually responding to the disaster, going so far as to claim it was “really awkward” that the vice president would “insert herself” into phone calls to affected states about federal relief funds.

“Your reaction to what seems to be this preemptive attempt by Biden and Harris and the media to silence critics of any aspect of the government’s response by calling it all disinformation?” asked host Laura Ingraham.

“Yeah, this is a kind of a standard playbook now, Laura, for anything they don’t like to hear,” Schmitt said. “They label it misinformation or disinformation. They’ve tried to censor this stuff before during Covid because … it wasn’t the regime’s narrative, and here we go again.”

“There are real stories, there are people hurting who are not getting help,” the MAGA Republican continued. “In fact, you know, relief efforts by private citizens were being blocked.... The federal government’s response here, led by Joe Biden and Kamala Harris, have completely failed the people of North Carolina.”

Republicans have launched a host of lies and disinformation throughout the 2024 hurricane season. So far, conservative leaders in heavily affected regions, including Florida and Georgia, have accused the Biden administration of diverting funds from FEMA to assist undocumented immigrants entering the country (a charge that FEMA has fervently rejected), claimed that working with the White House to expedite disaster relief “seemed political,” and conspiratorially suggested that the hurricanes are a government manipulation.

Some of those lies have had real-world consequences, convincing Americans in heavily affected regions that they shouldn’t apply for FEMA’s disaster relief based on the lie that the agency is out of money.

Speaking with CNN on Tuesday, former Republican communications strategist Douglas Heye lamented how Donald Trump’s own supporters were bearing the brunt of the misinformation.

“The area of North Carolina that was hit is overwhelmingly Republican,” Heye, a North Carolinian, told the network. “By spreading this misinformation, you’re hurting your own voters first. And we know Donald Trump takes his people sort of as a special case, he’s damaging them for his own political good. That’s malicious.”