President Biden spoke by phone with elected officials in Florida on Wednesday evening as the powerful and extremely dangerous Hurricane Milton swept through the state.

And the president also spoke with Democratic and Republican senators from states hit hard by Hurricane Helene, which ripped a path of destruction through the Southeast nearly two weeks ago.

“I have directed my team to do everything we can to save lives and help communities before, during and after the hurricane — the one that just passed and this terrible one that is about to strike,” Biden said at the end of a long day monitoring the federal response to the storms.

And the President emphasized: “My most important message today is to those who are in the affected areas. Please listen to local authorities and follow all safety and evacuation instructions. This is serious, very serious.”

Biden cancels overseas trip as MILTON strikes FLORIDA

President Joe Biden delivers remarks on the federal government’s response to Hurricane Helene and preparations for Hurricane Milton in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington, Tuesday, Oct. 8, 2024. (AP Photo/Evan Vucci) (AP Photo/Evan Vucci)

Less than four weeks before Election Day in November, Vice President Kamala Harris and former President Trump engaged in a narrow margin of error showdown in the race to succeed Biden in the White House, and two of the hardest-hit candidates were affected, although the states of Helene – North With Carolina and Georgia among the seven key battlegrounds likely to decide the outcome of the 2024 election, the politics of federal disaster relief are once again the focus of the campaign.

Trump has repeatedly attacked Biden and Harris for nearly two weeks, accusing them of being incompetent in leading federal efforts to respond to the back-to-back deadly hurricanes.

EYE OF THE STORM: Back-to-back hurricanes impact Harris and Trump presidential race

“The worst hurricane response since Katrina,” the former president charged Wednesday, referring to the much-maligned initial federal response to Hurricane Katrina in 2005, which was heavily criticized for its slowness and ineffectiveness.

Speaking at a campaign rally in battleground Pennsylvania, Trump dropped another political bombshell on Harris, arguing: “She just led the worst bailout in history in North Carolina… the worst ever, they say.”

Republican presidential candidate former President Donald Trump speaks at a campaign rally at Riverfront Sports on Wednesday, Oct. 9, 2024, in Scranton, Pennsylvania. (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson) (AP Photo/Julia Demaree Nikhinson)

And the former president again made false claims that FEMA (Federal Emergency Management Agency) diverted disaster relief funds and spent them on undocumented migrants in the U.S., as he ratcheted up his inflammatory rhetoric on the explosive issue of illegal immigration.

“You know where they put the money: illegal immigrants are coming,” Trump said as the crowd of MAGA supporters booed loudly.

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A few hours earlier, as the president and vice president received their final briefing from FEMA and other federal agencies about storm preparations in Florida and relief efforts in the Southeast, Biden said: “We have an unprecedented number of resources made available to deal with . “We will continue to manage this crisis until the job is done.”

Biden also took aim at Trump, accusing him of leading an “attack of lies.”

The president charged that the rhetoric from Trump and other Republicans was “beyond ridiculous” and that “it has to stop.”

Harris, who replaced Biden in the 2024 Democratic nomination in July, expressed a similar message during an interview Wednesday on the Weather Channel.

“This is not the time for us as Americans to just point fingers at each other,” Harris said. “Anyone who considers themselves a leader should really care now about making people feel like we’re all working together and that we have the resources and the ability to work together on their behalf.”

FIND THE LATEST FOX NEWS WEATHER UPDATES ON HURRICANE MILTON HERE

But earlier this week, Harris and Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis of Florida engaged in a verbal argument over whether he ignored hurricane calls from her.

Democratic presidential candidate Vice President Kamala Harris greets people affected by Hurricane Helene in Augusta, Georgia, on Wednesday, Oct. 2, 2024, as Augusta Mayor Garnett Johnson looks on, right. (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster) (AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)

The vice president called DeSantis “selfish” and the governor accused Harris of playing “political games.”

“Natural disasters pose dangers and promise for presidential candidates,” longtime Republican strategist Colin Reed, a veteran of several Republican presidential campaigns, told Fox News.

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Reed noted, “It is an opportunity for the incumbent to demonstrate competence and consistent leadership and to demonstrate that his government can function at the central level in a time of danger.”

Brandon Marlow walks through floodwaters inundating the street after Hurricane Milton came ashore in the Sarasota area in Fort Myers, Florida, on October 9, 2024. People wait to assess the damage after the Category 3 hurricane made landfall. (Joe Raedle/Getty Images)

But for a sitting president, things don’t always go according to script.

Then-President George HW Bush suffered a political setback over FEMA’s disorganized efforts to provide relief to Florida after Hurricane Andrew, which struck the then-key battleground state just weeks before the 1992 election.

A decade later, his son – then-President George W. Bush – enjoyed a political resurgence in Florida during his re-election in 2004, thanks to his aggressive response to Hurricane Charley, which struck in August of that year.

Bush was narrowly reelected, thanks in large part to the success of the Sunshine State, but his administration’s storm-handling image took a major hit the following year due to Louisiana’s botched response to Hurricane Katrina.

When he ran for re-election in 2012, then-President Barack Obama’s aggressive response to Superstorm Sandy, which hit the East Coast just days before the election, likely helped him win.

Reed argued that “Vice President Harris cannot play a real role in the response to Helene and now Milton, as he vacillates back and forth, wary of being seen as too close to a deeply unpopular administration, but also aware of it.” is that their failures are perceived as such.” their failures and their political ballast that they have to carry for the next three weeks.”

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