With less than six weeks until the 2024 election, it can easily be shaken up by external factors such as Hurricane Helene, which caused unprecedented damage across two battleground states: North Carolina and Georgia. Florida was also severely hit.
North Carolina is facing one of the worst repercussions of the damage Helene caused, not only to communities but also to politics.
The storm damage can be compared to that of Hurricane Katrina, which killed more than 1,000 people and became a nightmare for former President George W. Bush. Meanwhile, Hurricane Helene’s death toll has already reached 175, and damage is expected to cost up to $160 billion, making it one of the deadliest and costliest in U.S. history.
How each candidate handles the situation can make or break a vote from those suffering in Helene’s aftermath and how the deadly storm will affect the election.
Reports indicate significant flooding at North Carolina polling sites, which has ignited concerns of mail service disruption. The Intelligencer pointed out that some people may experience “dislocations and psychological effects that might interfere with all kinds of civic participation.”
In tight presidential races such as this year’s, even if a few thousand people didn’t show up to vote, it could significantly impact the election results.
Earlier this week, the U.S. Postal Service suspended mailing services in Western North Carolina. This could present challenges to voters who still haven’t received their mail-in ballot or those who need to mail it in. As of September, 250,000 residents in the state requested mail-in ballots, and with the winner of the state likely being decided by just tens of thousands of votes, the storm could have a significant impact on the results.
“Millions are without power. There’s tens of thousands of people who have lost everything one month from an election in two of the most important battleground states,” Republican strategist Ford O’Connell said.
President Joe Biden has been criticized for his slow response to the disaster while urging Americans to “put politics aside.” He also echoed the usual Democrat-fueled climate change propaganda, saying that anyone who doubts climate change’s role in the hurricane “must be brain dead.”
“Scientists report that with warming oceans powering more intense rains, storms like Helene are getting stronger and stronger,” Biden said. “They’re not going to get less, they’re going to get stronger. Today in North Carolina, I saw the impacts of that fury.”
On the contrary, former President Donald Trump created a GoFundMe for the victims of Hurricane Helene, which has raised more than $3 million. He also visited towns impacted by the crisis, while Biden has spent most of it relaxing at his Delaware home.
Steven Smith, a political scientist and professor at Washington University, said that the burden of the storm damage falls on the Biden-Harris Administration, and how they respond to it can cause a political fallout just weeks before voters cast their ballots.
“Anything that seems a bit slow, even if it’s not slow … will have some political fallout for him and those associated with him. So I think the burden is clearly on the shoulder of the Democrats,” Smith said.
For Vice President Kamala Harris’ part, she opened her Las Vegas rally on Sunday offering condolences to victims and those suffering from the storm's aftermath. However, she has yet to visit the damaged areas.
A White House official said Harris plans to visit the impacted communities “as soon as it is possible without disrupting emergency response operations.” It is worth noting that it took Biden more than a year to visit the site of the East Palestine, Ohio, train derailment after toxic chemicals spilled, turning the area into an environmental disaster.
In 2016, Trump won Georgia and North Carolina, and in 2020, he won only North Carolina, while Biden took Georgia. However, a Decision Desk HQ found that the 45th president leads in North Carolina by 0.5 percentage points and 0.2 percentage points in Georgia.