Portman supports Harvey relief bill
Sen. Rob Portman on Thursday said he supports a rapid relief package for those suffering in storm-ravaged Texas and Louisiana.
He also denied that he was against disaster relief for 2012’s Hurricane Sandy, a megastorm that ripped up the East Coast. Portman said he was only against a $50 billion relief package pushed by Democrats, supporting a Republican bill instead.
The January 2013 vote is being rehashed now as floodwaters continue to flow through Houston, Beaumont and Port Arthur. As many as 80 percent of those affected lack flood insurance, a federal program with financial troubles of its own.
It’s going to take another massive aide package to help the Lone Star State recover from the deluge, but many members of the Texas congressional delegation are being accused of hypocrisy in asking for it. All but one of its Republican members voted against Sandy relief.
Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, who was voted against Sandy relief, is now claiming that the Sandy bill contained a lot of unrelated spending, but The Washington Post’s factchecker awarded that claim three Pinocchios. New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, a Republican whose state was ravaged by Sandy, called Cruz’s claims “reprehensible lies.”
For his part, Portman said he supported disaster relief for Sandy — and he supports relief for Harvey now.
“I voted for (relief) for Superstorm Sandy, but not the bill the Democrats wanted,” he said.
In Harvey, Texas faces “one of the most dramatic natural disasters in American history,” Portman said, explaining that it will take a supplemental-spending bill to address it.
“But we have to respond and respond quickly.”