The White House criticized Ron DeSantis for reports that Florida’s Republican governor declined calls from President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris as officials continue hurricane recovery efforts and prepare to as another one makes landfall later this week.
“It’s up to him whether or not he wants to respond to us,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters at Monday’s briefing.
Harris, a White House official told CNN, has contacted DeSantis several times since Hurricane Helene made landfall in his state, but the governor has not returned the vice president’s calls. When Biden visited Florida last week to assess storm damage on the ground, DeSantis declined to join him, instead holding a news conference with reporters four hours south of the area visited by the president.
“We invited the governor, that’s right, to come and inspect the damaged areas with the president – obviously we were in Florida, we invited the governor of Florida to come, it was his decision not to go there. to attend or not to be there with the president,” said Jean-Pierre “The president reached out following Hurricane Helene. It depends on the governor, it really depends on the governor.
CNN has reached out to the White House, the Harris campaign and DeSantis’ office for details on the outreach between Biden, Harris and DeSantis.
NBC News first reported that DeSantis did not return Harris’ calls.
This isn’t the first time Florida’s governor has avoided a meeting with Biden in the wake of a natural disaster. In 2023, he refused to meet with Biden during a trip to the state following Hurricane Idalia, even after the president said he planned to meet with the Republican governor.
FEMA Administrator Deanne Criswell spoke with DeSantis on Sunday to discuss preparations for Hurricane Milton, which is expected to make landfall in Florida on Wednesday.
“She spoke to him yesterday about Milton,” Jean-Pierre said. “And we’re certainly going to continue to preposition ourselves on the ground, and we’re going to support communities with whatever they need at all times. This is our commitment.
The press secretary, however, insisted that the federal government remains focused on disaster recovery in the state, whether or not DeSantis responds to calls from the president or vice president.
“This is something the governor needs to talk about.” If you have the president and the vice president reaching out to offer assistance to your constituents, to the people who live in your state, to make sure that we’re doing everything that we need to do in terms of the federal response, and we “Reaching out, offering our support, that’s for the governor, it’s up to him whether he wants to respond to us or not,” she said.
She continued: “But what we are doing is working with state and local officials to make sure that we are pre-positioned and ready to be there for the communities that are going to be impacted – we are doing the necessary work.
Federal officials, the press secretary said, will provide a “robust whole-of-government response.”
“And for anything else, I should let the governor decide his actions, how he wants to move forward in this area. This is for him, this is a question for the governor,” she said.
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