Council pushes Prez for an investigation

The City Council is asking President Trump to support a bipartisan commission to investigate the federal response to Hurricane Maria — which Council members argued was an “utter disappointment,” particularly compared to hurricane responses on the mainland.

Council Speaker Corey Johnson and another 40 members of the Council signed on to a letter to Trump on Wednesday saying the President — who has dismissed climbing death tolls released in the wake of the storm — has underestimated the impact the storm had on the island.

“You claimed Hurricane Maria was not ‘a real catastrophe’ but, as the most recent death toll shows, nearly 3,000 deaths were caused by the disaster. That is a real catastrophe by any standard,” they wrote. “With hurricane season upon us, the residents of Puerto Rico – our fellow Americans – are still fighting to get their lives back to normal, and they need more than staged photo ops, tweets and paper towels.”