Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y., Tuesday lambasted President Donald Trump as a "bully and a coward" for his reaction to Puerto Rico as it continues to recover from a pair of back-to-back hurricanes that slammed the territory in 2017.
Trump early Tuesday attacked the territory's political leaders, calling them "grossly incompetent, and Gillibrand, a 2020 presidential candidate said on "MSNBC Live with Stephanie Ruhle" that Puerto Rico has not received $91 billion.
"Less than half of that has been authorized and received, and, in fact, when President Trump went down to Puerto Rico and threw paper towels at people who were desperate with no clean drinking water, no access to electricity at the time, it was such a disregard of not only their humanity, but his role as commander in chief and president of the United States," she added.
Gillibrand said she voted against a massive disaster funding bill because Trump "cut out the rebuilding money, the money they actually need to begin to rebuild the infrastructure of those islands."
Also on Tuesday, Gillibrand said it would be legal to turn over the unredacted version of special counsel Robert Mueller's to Congress, as members are permitted to see sealed, confidential information that includes grand jury testimony.
"If there are parts of it that are protected material, grand jury material, or top secret material, we know how to protect that information," said Gillibrand.
Sandy Fitzgerald ✉
Sandy Fitzgerald has more than three decades in journalism and serves as a general assignment writer for Newsmax covering news, media, and politics.
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