WASHINGTON (Reuters) – President Joe Biden’s finances director referred to as on U.S. lawmakers on Monday to rapidly go emergency catastrophe aid funding within the wake of damaging storms and mentioned it could ship Congress a funding bundle in coming days.
Biden’s administration has made a number of requests for extra catastrophe support since Congress final handed supplemental funding in December 2022, however lawmakers haven’t acted regardless of a number of storms together with Hurricanes Helene and Milton, White Home Workplace of Administration and Finances Director Shalanda Younger mentioned.
Extreme storms even have hit Alaska, Connecticut, Louisiana, New Mexico, Virginia, Pennsylvania and Illinois, she wrote in a memo.
“The Biden-Harris Administration stands able to work with lawmakers to ship the important sources our communities want with robust bipartisan and bicameral assist,” Younger mentioned, including that catastrophe aid is just not sometimes a partisan difficulty.
Younger didn’t say how a lot the administration would search however famous the roughly $120 billion after Hurricanes Harvey, Irma and Maria in 2017, $90 billion in 2015 after Hurricane Katrina, and $50 billion after Hurricane Sandy in 2013.
She additionally famous that Republican Home Speaker Mike Johnson, who visited North Carolina final month within the wake of Hurricane Helene, had informed reporters Congress would take bipartisan motion to supply an “applicable quantity” of federal funds.
Representatives for Johnson couldn’t be instantly reached for touch upon the request, which requires congressional approval. A brand new Republican-led Congress convenes in early January and Biden leaves workplace Jan. 20, handing over the White Home to Republican Donald Trump.
Hurricane Milton got here ashore on Oct. 9 and carved a swathe of destruction throughout Florida, together with an estimated $1.5 billion to $2.5 billion in crops and agricultural infrastructure harm alone, amongst different losses.
Hurricane Helene had made landfall farther north simply weeks earlier.
Analysts have mentioned they anticipate as much as $55 billion in insured losses from this 12 months’s Hurricanes Helene and Milton.
