Texas Governor Greg Abbott leaves residents of his own state out to dry during Hurricane Beryl and continued to be out of state to go to RNC activities, while not tackling natural disaster consequences as millions of people were left without power in scorching heat. Yasmin Kahn and Adrienne Lawrence break it down on The Damage Report.
Read more here: Gov. Greg Abbott defends trip to East Asia during Hurricane Beryl
“Under scrutiny for spending the duration of Hurricane Beryl 8,000 miles away on an economic development trip to Asia, Gov. Greg Abbott is defiant — insisting his absence did nothing to hinder Texas’ disaster response.
The governor and his aides say they were in constant communication with emergency leaders and Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick, who assumed the role of acting governor and will briefly do so again this week when Abbott departs for the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee. They insist state officials met every local need that arose, requested federal aid without delay and ran a well-oiled machine — seasoned by past storms like Hurricane Harvey.
Still, Abbott’s absence prompted a wave of unflattering headlines and editorials blasting his trip, and Texas Democrats are now calling for the governor to skip the convention, rather than “jetting off to applaud Donald Trump while Texans are still suffering” from power outages and property damage.”
