San Juan mayor Carmen Yulin Cruz is gaining attention as a target of Twitter attacks by U.S. President Donald Trump — including one tweet Sunday calling her and others “politically motivated ingrates.”
The insult came after Cruz appeared on television in a black shirt with white letters that read, “HELP US, WE ARE DYING.” Cruz said that federal aid has been slow to reach Puerto Rico in the days following Hurricane Maria, which knocked out power to the entire island and destroyed thousands of homes. “If anybody out there is listening to us, we are dying and you are killing us with the inefficiency and the bureaucracy,” she said.
The message apparently did not sit well with Trump, who took to Twitter and accused the mayor of poor leadership, saying “they want everything to be done for them when it should be a community effort.”
Some of Puerto Rico’s mayors have praised federal hurricane relief efforts, while others have joined Cruz in saying they have been insufficient and slow-moving.