Florence Death Toll Rises To 37 During Trump's North Carolina Visit

Source: Talking Points Memo/The AP



By Chuck Burton and MARTHA WAGGONER

September 19, 2018 12:47 pm

WILMINGTON, N.C. (AP) — The death toll from Hurricane Florence climbed to at least 37, including two mental health patients who drowned when a sheriff’s van was swept away by floodwaters, and North Carolina’s governor pleaded with thousands of evacuees not to return home just yet.

President Donald Trump, meanwhile, arrived in storm-ravaged North Carolina on Wednesday, visiting a church in the hard-hit coastal of town New Bern where volunteers have been handing out food to storm victims.

Wilmington, population 120,000, was still mostly an island surrounded by floodwaters, and people waited for hours Tuesday for handouts of food, water and tarps. Thousands of others around the state waited in shelters for the all-clear.

“I know it was hard to leave home, and it is even harder to wait and wonder whether you even have a home to go back to,” Gov. Roy Cooper said.

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