Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump and his running mate Mike Pence are going to Baton Rouge, Louisiana on Friday to meet victims of the flooding that has killed 13 and forced 30,000 Louisianans to leave their homes.
“I hope everyone in Louisiana knows that our country is praying for them, and standing with them to help them in these difficult hours,” Trump said at a rally in Charlotte, North Carolina on Thursday.
President Obama has given no indication he will interrupt his two week vacation in exclusive Martha’s Vineyard to visit the flood victims. The president played another round of golf Thursday with television star Larry David and Bain Capital co-managing partner Jonathan Lavine.
The Obama family’s vacation is scheduled to continue until Sunday.
Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton will be resting from the campaign trail on Friday, and will also not be visiting Louisiana over the weekend. She currently has no campaign events scheduled until Sunday, when she will be holding a fundraiser in Provincetown, Massachusetts featuring the entertainer Cher.
A number of recent stories have focused on questions about Clinton’s health and her need for extensive rest over the weekends.
On Thursday, Clinton addressed the Louisiana flooding in a two sentence tweet:
Closely monitoring the flooding in Louisiana & Mississippi. The @RedCross is helping displaced families in need: https://t.co/sSYTbQMndP -H
— Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) August 16, 2016
On Wednesday the Baton Rouge Advocate called on President Obama to take a break from his vacation and visit Louisiana.
“The optics of Obama golfing while Louisiana residents languished in flood waters was striking. It evoked the precedent of the passive federal response to the state’s agony in 2005, a chapter of history no one should ever repeat,” the paper said, adding:
Now that the flood waters ravaging Louisiana are receding, it’s time for President Barack Obama to visit the most anguished state in the union.
Last week, as torrential rains brought death, destruction and misery to Louisiana, the president continued his vacation at Martha’s Vineyard, a playground for the posh and well-connected.
We’ve seen this story before in Louisiana, and we don’t deserve a sequel. In 2005, a fly-over by a vacationing President George W. Bush became a symbol of official neglect for the victims of Hurricane Katrina. The current president was among those making political hay out of Bush’s aloofness.
The mainstream media, which was so critical of President George W. Bush’s handling of the Katrina flooding of New Orleans in 2005, has no such criticism of President Obama’s hands off approach to this year’s Louisiana flooding.
Source: Breitbart
