Poll: Majority of Puerto Ricans give Trump negative rating on Hurricane Maria response

More than half of Puerto Rico’s residents gave President Trump a negative rating for his response to Hurricane Maria, according to a new poll.

A Washington Post-Kaiser Family Foundation survey found that 52 percent of respondents said Trump did a “poor” job with his response. Only 15 percent said Trump’s response to Hurricane Maria, which killed more than 3,000 residents after making landfall in September 2017, was “excellent,” “very good” or “good.” Out of those positive ratings, 3 percent said Trump’s response was “excellent.”

The poll results were published the same day that Trump praised his administration’s handling of the Hurricane Maria aftermath.

{mosads}“We got A Pluses for our recent hurricane work in Texas and Florida (and did an unappreciated great job in Puerto Rico, even though an inaccessible island with very poor electricity and a totally incompetent Mayor of San Juan),” Trump tweeted on Wednesday morning.

Survey respondents gave higher marks to the Puerto Rican government, Gov. Ricardo Rosselló, the federal government and municipal governments.

The poll, which consisted of face-to-face interviews with 1,500 Puerto Ricans and has a margin of error of 3.5 percentage points, is the most comprehensive look at residents’ views of the damage and recovery efforts almost a year after the hurricane.

The poll was conducted in July and August, but its release comes the same week that Trump touted his administration’s actions surrounding Hurricane Maria, saying in the Oval Office on Tuesday that he thinks his administration’s response was an “incredible, unsung success.”

The comment sparked a backlash from Puerto Rican officials.