Hurricane Helene coverage might be dwindling in the mainstream media, but Blaze News investigative journalist Steve Baker isn’t giving up on the victims.
“I actually met with the primary director here on the ground of FEMA,” Baker, who’s on the ground in North Carolina, tells Jill Savage and Matthew Peterson of “Blaze News Tonight.”
And what he’s found is “interesting.”
“There is absolutely incontrovertible evidence that FEMA has a much larger footprint on the ground in the disaster zone here. They have ten disaster relief centers already set up. They now have a massive warehouse with just thousands of pallets of dry goods, of drinks of water, all types of humanitarian aid and needs that are required to be delivered,” Baker explains.
“Yet all of the people also on the ground, working in these distant remote communities, never see them,” he adds.
Baker, who’s been working in two of the worst-hit areas in North Carolina, has seen “no FEMA.”
“Zero. Not one sign of them. So they have more goods, they have more services, they have more people,” he says. “They dwarf everyone else’s operations; we just don’t know where they’re delivering everything.”
When Baker did get a chance to speak with someone from FEMA, that individual's response was not comforting.
“I asked him, ‘Why are we not seeing the government agencies, federal agencies, state, local, county, whatever, out at these recovery sites?'" Baker explains. “He just shrugged and he said, ‘I think that they’re just tired of seeing the death.’”
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Hospitals across America are scrambling after damage to a supplier in North Carolina has jeopardized their inventory of IV fluids.
Baxter International, a factory that manufactures medical products in Marion, North Carolina, about 35 miles outside Asheville, was battered by Hurricane Helene. Muddy conditions, damaged bridges, flooding, and other concerns have forced the factory to shut down for the time being.
'If we get a big burn, we can blow through a ton of these fluids very quickly.'
"The safety of our employees, their families, and the communities in which we operate remains our utmost concern, and we are committed to helping ensure reliable supply of products to patients," said a statement from José "Joe" Almeida, chair, president, and chief executive officer at Baxter. "Remediation efforts are already underway, and we will spare no resource -- human or financial -- to resume production and help ensure patients and providers have the products they need."
According to CBS News, Baxter provides about 60% of the country's IV fluid bags, so the shutdown there has left hospitals from as far away as Massachusetts and Oregon implementing emergency procedures to deal with a possible shortfall of IV fluids.
A long-time medical professional at Mass General Brigham in Boston explained to Blaze News that an IV fluid shortage can impact patients with many different medical needs.
"Patients that are dehydrated, patients that can't eat, patients that can't swallow, patients that have had surgery, that have come in for surgery, patients that have come in for surgery where the surgery hasn't gone well, patients that are bleeding and need resuscitative fluids, trauma patients, burn patients, cancer patients, you know, it covers all the population," said the medical staff member who preferred not to be named.
"If we get a big burn, we can blow through a ton of these fluids very quickly."
Thus far, Mass General Brigham has managed to meet patient needs, the medical professional told Blaze News.
However, he also shared a screenshot of a memo, issued by the hospital on October 2, that makes the severity of the situation clear. The memo claims the hospital is experiencing "a serious and immediate IV fluid shortage" and demands that medical personnel "immediately act to conserve fluids."
The hospital did not respond to a request for comment from Blaze News, but Dr. Paul Biddinger, the chief preparedness and continuity officer at Mass General Brigham, admitted to CBS News that the hospital is enduring "one of the biggest shortages" in its history.
At a news conference on Friday, Biddinger claimed he expects MGB will continue to receive about 40% of the usual supply from Baxter.
Chris Laman, vice president of strategy for Columbia Memorial Hospital in Astoria, Oregon, told NPR a similar story.
"My hospital has been told we can expect 40% of what we normally order," Laman told the outlet in an email. "We are talking about having to limit elective surgeries."
In the meantime, manufacturers located well outside the path of Hurricane Helene and the subsequent flood zone are attempting to make up for the shortages. B. Braun told CBS News that it is "taking immediate steps to increase production at our pharmaceutical manufacturing sites in Irvine, California, and Daytona Beach, Florida, focusing on critical IV fluids."
Many experienced medical professionals have also already dealt with a similar shortage after Hurricane Maria brought a major IV fluid manufacturer in Puerto Rico to a halt in 2017.
"Having experienced similar challenges in the wake of Hurricane Maria in 2017, we continue to be mindful of how we manage the supply of these medications to ensure minimal impact on our patients. Hospital operations continue as normal and patient care remains unaffected," Biddinger said.
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Former Obama chief strategist David Axelrod predicted that "upscale," "liberal" North Carolina residents hit hard by Hurricane Helene are "probably going to figure out a way to vote" in the presidential election next month — but suggested that those in the same area who would cast ballots for former President Donald Trump likely won't be as resourceful.
Axelrod — a dyed-in-the-wool leftist — made the eye-popping declaration last week on an episode of his "Hacks on Tap" podcast when speaking about swing states like North Carolina and the devastation Helene left behind.
'I’m not sure a bunch of these folks who’ve had their homes and lives destroyed elsewhere in Western North Carolina — in the mountains there — are gonna be as easy to wrangle for the Trump campaign.'
He called the city of Asheville a "blue dot" in Western North Carolina and said that despite the large-scale displacement in the surrounding area due to Helene, voters in Asheville have the smarts to get their votes in for Democrat presidential nominee Kamala Harris.
"Those voters in Asheville are — they’re, you know, the kind of voters who will figure out a way to vote," Axelrod said. "You know, they’re upscale, kind of liberal voters, and they’re probably going to figure out a way to vote."
But as for Trump-backers in the area hit hard by Helene? Not so much, apparently.
"I’m not sure a bunch of these folks who’ve had their homes and lives destroyed elsewhere in western North Carolina — in the mountains there — are gonna be as easy to wrangle for the Trump campaign," Axelrod said.
He added, "I don’t know how that’s all going to play out, but it’s an unpredictable element in North Carolina that has made it maybe a little more interesting" in the run-up to the election.
Axelrod also said that "northern-tier battleground states other than Wisconsin are scary" for Democrats and that "you can't count on them." He added that Harris "needs to find an insurance policy" and a "second act" as the campaign races to the finish line.
Fox News pointed out some prominent X users who took issue with Axelrod’s statements:
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Asheville, the western North Carolina city known as "The Portland of the South," officially approved a multi-million dollar reparations plan this week.
Last June, the Asheville City Council unanimously approved a resolution to address slavery and racial discrimination by distributing reparations to black residents. The plan does not "mandate direct payments," but instead directs the city to invest money in areas of the city where black residents "face disparities," USA Today reported.
During a city council meeting on Tuesday, Asheville leaders approved $2.1 million for reparations.
The money, according to the Asheville Citizen Times, is being "pulled from proceeds of a land sale rather than the city's general fund." City leaders, however, did not specify how the money will be spent.
"There was a question about, well, how will this be spent? What are the projects?" City Manager Debra Campbell said. "We don't know yet. What we do know is that we have asked the commission once it is formed, to provide us with short, medium and long-term initiatives."
Meanwhile, supporters of reparations criticized the approved amount as too small, while others suggested that defunding the police is a form of reparations.
From the Citizen Times:
During a public hearing on the city's planned $201.7 million budget, speakers expressed dissatisfaction with the amount, saying the $2.1 million is not enough and that divesting from the city police department would be a form or reparations. Others said the money could be better spent, including that $2.1 million could create eight Black homeowners and that with the proposed tax hike, they're being priced out of the city instead.
During the meeting, the city council also approved a proclamation declaring June 19 as "Juneteenth" — the annual celebration commemorating the end of slavery — a city holiday.
Earlier this year, Evanston, Illinois, became one of the first U.S. cities to approve a reparations plan, agreeing to distribute $10 million to black residents over the next decade. Other cities considering reparations plans include, Amherst, Massachusetts; Providence, Rhode Island; and Iowa City, Iowa.
Like in Asheville, activists criticized Evanston's plan for not being sufficiently aggressive.
A week after the storm, a man came into the GOP office to ask about volunteering. 'I’ll have to do it around my wife’s funeral,' the teary-eyed man said. 'My country needs me.'
A reparations task force in California has estimated black residents are entitled to more than $223,000 each to compensate for racism and slavery.
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