FEMA Administrator Brock Long ripped San Juan Mayor Carmen Yulín Cruz for her attacks on the agency Sunday, saying "we filtered out the mayor a long time ago" and he didn't have time for "political noise."
President Donald Trump visited the Hurricane Maria devastation in Puerto Rico on Tuesday and praised relief efforts there, but Cruz criticized him for his "abominable" behavior when Trump threw paper towel rolls to storm survivors and said his visit was a publicity stunt.
It was the latest in the war of words between the two after Trump said last weekend she had exhibited poor leadership in response to her criticism of the federal response as too slow.
She tweeted Sunday morning that after power collapses in the San Juan hospital, she had asked for help from FEMA and gotten nothing.
Increasingly painful to undestand the american people want to help and US Gov does not want to help. WE NEED WATER! @cnnbrk
— Carmen Yulín Cruz (@CarmenYulinCruz) October 8, 2017
Power collapses in San Juan hospital with 2 patients being transferred out. Have requested support from @FEMA_Brock NOTHING! @cnnbrk
— Carmen Yulín Cruz (@CarmenYulinCruz) October 8, 2017
The Hospital had requested support from FEMA and no response. Oh sorry they are collecting data...
— Carmen Yulín Cruz (@CarmenYulinCruz) October 8, 2017
After reading out the tweets, ABC host Martha Raddatz asked Long for his response on "This Week."
"We filtered out the mayor a long time ago," Long said. "We don't have time for the political noise. The bottom line is we are making progress every day in conjunction with the governor."
Long went on to say the the rebuilding of the island would be a lengthy process. With regard to the power outages in hospitals, Long said they were monitoring the system daily and life-flighting ICU patients out of those places and onto the USNS Comfort.
"As far as the political noise, we filter that out, keep our heads down, and continue to make progress and push forward restoring essential functions for Puerto Rico," he said.
Long criticized Cruz last week for not being plugged into joint efforts on the island.