US hurricanes followed by Republican storm of misinformation about relief efforts

4c4d9f02-312c-4794-b1e2-f2a81684acfe_027fe8ad

Incessant rains and flooding battered Florida on Thursday after Hurricane Milton made landfall in the US as a Category 3 storm, leaving at least four dead and more than three million homes and businesses without power – two weeks after Hurricane Helene claimed more than 220 lives across six states, including Florida, North Carolina and Georgia.

Typically, US disaster relief is a bipartisan effort. But the back-to-back hurricanes have collided with this overheated election season, and Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump and his Make America Great Again allies have relentlessly criticised the federal response, propagating bizarre claims and unfounded conspiracy theories.