Trump meltdown shows he doesn't know Puerto Rico is part of the US

Geography clearly wasn’t a part of that Ivy League education Trump loves to brag about.

In a racist tirade on Twitter Tuesday morning, Trump proved he has no idea that Puerto Rico is a part of the United States, slamming the U.S. territory for how it spent disaster relief funding after Hurricane Maria devastated the island.

“Puerto Rico got 91 Billion Dollars for the hurricane, more money than has ever been gotten for a hurricane before, & all their local politicians do is complain & ask for more money,” Trump tweeted, using a dollar amount that fact-checkers say is wildly inaccurate — with the aid money closer to $15 billion.

“The pols are grossly incompetent, spend the money foolishly or corruptly, & only take from USA,” Trump tweeted — suggesting he thinks Puerto Rico is “taking” from the U.S. rather than getting the same kind of disaster aid any other U.S. state or city would receive.

Puerto Rico residents are United States citizens, and pay taxes just like the people of Texas and Florida, who were also hit by devastating storms but haven’t been attacked by Trump. Of course, both of those states voted for Trump in the presidential election — draw your own conclusions from that.

But Trump’s unfair and inaccurate Puerto Rico attacks didn’t stop there.

Trump went on to claim he’s “the best thing that ever happened to Puerto Rico.” And said that the Puerto Ricans “continue to hurt our Farmers and States with these massive payments, and so little appreciation!” — otherizing an entire segment of diverse U.S. citizens to say they somehow are taking from farmers.

Of course, 3.05 million of the 3.18 million farm operators are white, according to the 2012 Census of Agriculture, unlike Puerto Rico, which is almost entirely Hispanic. And farmers get massive subsidies from the government yet receive none of the shaming from Trump. You can draw your own conclusions there.

This is not Trump’s first tirade against Puerto Rico, which is still struggling to recover from Hurricane Maria.

Back in January, the White House said food aid money to Puerto Rico was “excessive and unnecessary.”

Last week, Trump complained that Puerto Rico was getting too much aid money, despite the fact that the island was almost completely decimated and is still struggling to rebuild after the storm.

And this week, he once again attacked the struggling people of the island after Democrats refused to vote for a disaster relief package because it didn’t include funding for Puerto Rico.

After the bill failed, Trump on Monday railed against the political leadership of the island, saying they are all “incompetent or corrupt.”

Talk about the pot calling the kettle black.

Published with permission of The American Independent Foundation.