Jeremy Konyndyk on Trump's Puerto Rico Failures

Tweet storm from Jeremy Konyndyk (fmr. US Foreign Disaster Assistance chief):

"The White House took their eye off the ball at the worst moment.
The 2-3 days immediately after a major event are critical; that's when you gauge damage to calibrate a response.
During that critical window, rather than shaping a response, Trump was at his golf club. He held no meetings on Puerto Rico.
Senior administration officials didn't visit Puerto Rico to assess situation first-hand until 5 days post storm. That's inexcusable.
What finally set Trump off and spurred his attention was not briefings - it was bad press coverage.
He didn't hold a high level meeting on the storm response until Tuesday - Six DAYS after landfall. This is disaster mgmt malpractice.
And it has become clearer and clearer that response hasn't had the resources and people it needs - as Dept. Of Defense is now admitting.
Why do I call this malpractice? Because they had all the tools they needed to see this for what it was; if only they'd paid attention.
Storm played out exactly as forecast. Was clear it would be devastating, and it was. And then....the President left things on autopilot.
And that has had real, tangible, harmful consequences for the speed and effectiveness of the response.
FEMA staff deserve better. DoD staff deserve better. And most of all, the people of Puerto Rico deserve better. This is not leadership."