Sunday, August 30, 2020

RSN: Al Gore: Trump Is Putting 'Knee on the Neck of Democracy'

 

 

Reader Supported News
30 August 20


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Al Gore: Trump Is Putting 'Knee on the Neck of Democracy'
Al Gore. (photo: Andreas Pein/Laif/Redux)
Joseph Ax, Reuters
Ax writes: "Former U.S. Vice President Al Gore on Tuesday accused President Donald Trump of trying to 'put his knee on the neck of democracy' by undermining mail-in voting and sowing doubts, without evidence, about the integrity of the Nov. 3 election."

“He seems to have no compunctions at all about trying to rip apart the social fabric and the political equilibrium of the American people, and he’s strategically planting doubts in advance,” Gore, a Democrat, said during a Reuters Newsmaker event with Reuters Editor-in-Chief Stephen Adler and Editor-at-Large Harold Evans.

Gore, who served as vice president from 1993 to 2001 during Bill Clinton’s presidency and lost the 2000 presidential election to Republican George W. Bush, called Trump’s actions a “despicable strategy.”

Trump has made unsubstantiated claims that voting by mail, a regular feature of U.S. elections that is expected to increase this year amid the coronavirus pandemic, will cause widespread fraud, while also refusing to say he would accept the election result should he lose to Democratic challenger Joe Biden.

Gore said Americans must be prepared for vote tallies that take days to complete after Election Day, and that the candidate who appears to be winning in initial results may end up losing once all ballots are counted.

In 2000, Gore and Bush were separated by only a few hundred votes in the battleground state of Florida, whose electoral votes would determine the election’s outcome.

The result remained in limbo until more than a month after Election Day, when the conservative-majority U.S. Supreme Court resolved the contest in Bush’s favor, prompting Gore - who had won the nationwide popular vote but lost in the complex state-by-state Electoral College - to concede.

“It turns out there’s no intermediate step between a final Supreme Court decision and violent revolution,” Gore said, smiling, of his decision to concede. “It seemed to me that respect for the rule of law and respect for the needs of American democracy were the orders of the day.”

“You can always explore the option of dragging something out, tearing the country apart, mobilizing partisans against one another in the streets and all of that, but it was not a wise course for our country,” Gore added.

‘NOT REALLY UP TO HIM’

Gore said he believes the rule of law would hold fast this year, even if Trump does not accept the election results.

“It’s not really up to him,” Gore said, noting that Trump’s term would end on Jan. 20, 2021, if he loses, under parameters set by the U.S. Constitution.

U.S. Secret Service and other military and security forces would answer to the new president as of that date, Gore added.

Trump’s attacks on mail-in ballots, coupled with Postal Service cuts that already have caused delivery delays, have raised concerns among his critics that he is seeking to depress voter turnout.

“To try to deprive people who are scared of the pandemic from voting by mail by dismantling the Postal Service - he’s attempting to put his knee on the neck of democracy,” Gore said.

In response, Trump campaign spokeswoman Thea McDonald said Gore and other Democrats should “quit pushing their conspiracy theories.”

“Al Gore is brazenly laying the groundwork for Joe Biden to dispute November’s election results when President Trump wins - just as Gore himself did back in 2000,” McDonald said.

Trump trails Biden in opinion polls as he seeks re-election amid a pandemic that has killed more than 177,000 Americans.

U.S. Postmaster General Louis DeJoy, a Trump ally and campaign donor, has told Congress he has made Postal Service changes to lower costs, not to disrupt mail-in voting.

‘STILL TIME’

Gore, a Nobel Peace Prize-winning environmental advocate, said policymakers cannot afford to ignore global climate change even as they grapple with the pandemic.

The two crises “are braided together,” Gore said. In both cases, scientists with “their hair on fire” have warned of potentially deadly consequences - and both have exposed racial and economic inequities that undergird society, Gore added.

Unlike the pandemic, which triggered economic shutdowns intended to curb the pathogen’s spread, climate change can be mitigated by investing in the economy’s future, Gore said.

The two fastest-growing jobs in the United States are solar-energy panel installer and wind-turbine technician, Gore said, demonstrating the so-called green economy’s potential.

Gore praised Biden for putting a major investment in environmental jobs in his economic plan and for promising if elected to rejoin the 2015 Paris agreement that set emissions goals for nearly 200 nations. Trump intends to withdraw from the accord on Nov. 4, the earliest possible date.

“There is still time,” Gore added, “to solve this crisis before it reaches its catastrophic stage. Damage has already been done, and more will be done. But we still can avoid the worst of the consequences.”

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Police stop briefly in front of a crowd of protesters around 7 p.m., Wednesday, August 26, 2020, at Civic Center Park in Kenosha. (photo: Angela Major/WPR)
Police stop briefly in front of a crowd of protesters around 7 p.m., Wednesday, August 26, 2020, at Civic Center Park in Kenosha. (photo: Angela Major/WPR)


Police, Federal Agents Use Unmarked Vehicles in Arrests of Kenosha Protesters
Rob Mentzer, WPR
Mentzer writes: "Police and federal law enforcement agents used unmarked vehicles to arrest and detain protesters on Wednesday in Kenosha. According to activists, at least 12 protesters were arrested this way."

Arrests Came During Peaceful Protests That Followed Nights Of Unrest

video posted online shows a man wearing a U.S. Marshal uniform along with police pointing guns at a van stopped near a gas station, then breaking the van's window and taking passengers away in vehicles without markings or license plates.

The people in the van were part of Riot Kitchen 206, a Seattle nonprofit that provides food for protesters. A board member with the organization called the arrests "a nightmare."

"My friends were snatched in broad daylight by people in unmarked vans, and I didn’t know what was happening to them for hours," Jennifer Scheurle said. 

The group of nine was part of a caravan heading from the Pacific Northwest to Washington, D.C., to support protests of racial injustice and police brutality, Scheurle said. After a Kenosha police officer on Sunday shot 29-year-old Jacob Blake seven times in the back during an arrest, the group decided to detour to Kenosha to help protesters there.

At an afternoon press conference, activist Omar Flores with the Milwaukee Alliance Against Racist and Political Oppression said another three student activists were taken in unmarked pickup trucks Wednesday evening by men who told them, "Don't even try it, we're cops."

"When there’s an unmarked vehicle coming up to you and somebody just says 'we're cops,' are you supposed to just take their word for it?" Flores said. "Couldn't anyone just go around and do that? Is this what we really want to look like as a country?"

The arrests are similar to arrests of protesters in July in Portland, Oregon, when federal agents' use of unmarked vehicles was part of a broader escalation of law enforcement tactics there. The acting Homeland Security Secretary at the time confirmed to NPR that the agency had used the tactic.

Flores read a letter from the Milwaukee National Lawyers Guild, who called on the Wisconsin Department of Justice and U.S. Department of Justice to investigate the use of unmarked vehicles in arrests. Flores said his group is calling for the immediate release and all charges dropped for those arrested on curfew violations, which he called unconstitutional.

He said activist Adelana Akindes, 26, of Kenosha was one of those arrested. Kenosha County Sheriff's Department records show Akindes was booked at 10:22 p.m. Wednesday on charges of failing to comply with the curfew order. The records do not include the time of her arrest.

Akindes' mother, Faye Akindes, said the style of the arrests is "part of a pattern of behavior between those in power, the state, the police department, the feds, and ordinary citizens participating in peaceful demonstrations" that is connected to incidents in Portland and elsewhere.

The arrests of the Riot Kitchen workers happened shortly after Kenosha's 7 p.m. curfew Wednesday night, when police mostly chose to keep their distance from a group of hundreds of peaceful protesters who marched through downtown until late Wednesday night. 

In a news release late Thursday afternoon, the Kenosha Police Department said they stopped a group of vehicles after receiving a tip from a citizen. One of those vehicles, a minivan, attempted to drive away when police stopped the others. According to police, that was what happened immediately before the confrontation captured on the video. The nine people in the van were arrested on suspicion of disorderly conduct. Police said the van contained illegal fireworks as well as helmets, gas masks and protective vests.

Kenosha County Sheriff David Beth declined to take questions from reporters at a Thursday afternoon press conference, but in a statement acknowledged the presence of federal agents.

"The feds have been here from the first day helping with the exact same mission that everyone else is, helping to protect the people of Kenosha," Beth said. 

But Scheurle said the nature of the arrest in unmarked vehicles is alarming. She spent all night trying to reach different agencies to find out where her friends were being held.

"No matter what your political affiliation is," she said, "what would it feel like to have your friends just be snatched from the street by people who aren’t even identified? Who are these people? Are they police? Are they not police? Are they random people who just snatched my friends at gunpoint? It's terrifying."

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'Regional border closures in response to the threat of the coronavirus have generated a new migration phenomenon: migrants from Central American nations having to be smuggled home.' (photo: VICE)
'Regional border closures in response to the threat of the coronavirus have generated a new migration phenomenon: migrants from Central American nations having to be smuggled home.' (photo: VICE)


Coyotes Are Now Smuggling Migrants Back Home After They've Given Up on America
Bryan Avelar and Deborah Bonello, VICE
Excerpt: "Travel restrictions around COVID-19 across Latin America mean some of those who want to get back home have to do it illegally."
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Armed civilians outside of a gas station during unrest in Kenosha, Wisconsin, August 25, 2020. (photo: Alex Lourie/Redux)
Armed civilians outside of a gas station during unrest in Kenosha, Wisconsin, August 25, 2020. (photo: Alex Lourie/Redux)


The Thin Blue Line Between Violent, Pro-Trump Militias and Police
Ryan Devereaux, The Intercept
Devereaux writes: "The videos that preceded Anthony Huber's killing on the streets of Kenosha, Wisconsin, are jarring."

Police in Kenosha told armed vigilantes, “We appreciate you guys. We really do.” Then one of them killed two protesters.

 Among the most chilling is one from the parking lot of an auto repair shop. Several shots ring out. In the distance, you see the gunman in jeans and a green T-shirt. A man rushes up behind him. The gunman turns. More shots ring out and the man collapses to the ground. The gunman circles a parked car, then comes back to the man laid out on the pavement. He looks down at him and pulls out his cellphone. “I just killed somebody,” the shooter says, before jogging off. The man on the ground twitches and stares up at the sky, gasping deeply as bystanders work desperately to put pressure on his wound. Some cry, others yell for someone to call the police.

In a second video, the gunman can be seen jogging down the center of a two-way street as bystanders yell that he just shot someone. He falls to the ground. A handful of men run toward him; Huber is one of them. The 26-year-old swings his skateboard at the shooter and reaches for his rifle. The shooter pulls the trigger. Huber staggers back, then collapses in the street. A second man, appearing to hold a handgun, takes a bullet in the arm. The gunman rises to his feet and jogs, then walks, toward a column of approaching emergency vehicles. Again, bystanders yell that he just shot people. The gunman, with his hands in the air, is seemingly ordered out of the way and the police move on. In a third video, shot before the killings took place, the same young gunman is seen interacting with law enforcement in an armored vehicle, accepting a bottle of water as thanks for the efforts he and others in a group of armed vigilantes were putting in. An officer in the vehicle says over a loudspeaker: “We appreciate you guys. We really do.”

Hours after the videos were taken, 17-year-old Kyle Rittenhouse, the suspected shooter, was arrested on charges of first-degree intentional homicide. By that point, he was miles away, in Antioch, Illinois, despite the fact that he had approached police and several bystanders identified him as the gunman whose shots law enforcement were ostensibly responding to. Rittenhouse is accused of killing Huber and Joseph Rosenbaum, a 36-year-old father who leaves behind a fiancée and young daughter, and wounding Gaige Grosskreutz, a volunteer street medic. The killings came on the third night of protests over the police shooting of Jacob Blake, an unarmed Black man who was left paralyzed after being shot in the back in front of his children. Like other moments around the country, the response to the police violence has featured large-scale peaceful demonstrations, vandalism, and property damage. Blake remains hospitalized and, according to his father, has been shackled to his bed despite being unable to move.

Heidi Beirich, the chief strategy officer at the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism, said she was unsurprised when she woke up to the news of violence in Kenosha Wednesday morning. The summer of 2020 has already seen the targeting of Black Lives Matter protesters with a bomb plot in Nevada, the targeted killing of a federal court security officer and the murder of a sheriff’s deputy by a suspected right-wing extremist in California, and a Ku Klux Klan leader driving his car into a crowd of police brutality protesters in Virginia.

“As we’re approaching the election and Trump is hyping fear over the protests and ginning these people on with all this of law order stuff, it’s going to get worse,” Beirich told The Intercept. “I don’t expect this, unfortunately, to be the end of it.”

At a press conference Wednesday, Kenosha County Sheriff David Beth offered no explanation as to why Rittenhouse was permitted to leave the scene of the shootings; in addition to being identified as a shooter out after curfew, the 17-year-old was not old enough to legally carry the weapon he did. “I don’t have a clue,” the sheriff told reporters, later adding, “I don’t even know the man’s name.” When asked why law enforcement gave armed vigilantes bottles of water, the sheriff said it was common practice. “Our deputies would toss a water to anybody.”

Hours before the shootings took place, the Kenosha Guard, a local militia group, issued a “call to arms” on Facebook, amplified by the conspiracy theory website InfoWars, urging armed citizens to come out in defense of private property. At Wednesday’s press conference, Beth indicated that the group had sought to be deputized by his office — a request that the sheriff claims he rejected.

Violent Pro-Trump Militias

The events in Kenosha are the latest in a long line of cases in which self-styled vigilantes have gathered under the banner of the “thin blue line” — a flag and movement devoted to the defense of law enforcement and the president — and engaged in violence with counterprotesters while police stood back.

Days before the killings in a Wisconsin, a so-called Back the Blue rally in Gilbert, Arizona, saw armed pro-police demonstrators beating counterprotesters while law enforcement looked on. In the run up to the confrontation, which are now a weekly event, supporters of the rally posted violent fantasies online and death threats against their critics. Days later, police in Portland stood by as gun-toting men waving “thin blue line” flags brawled with leftist protesters in the city’s streets. The clash came just weeks after Portland authorities acknowledged that a former Navy SEAL who had boasted about infiltrating “ANTIFA” was under investigation in connection with the detonation of an explosive device near protesters. Pro-police protests New York have also devolved into violence.

Mike German, a former FBI agent who went undercover in far-right groups in the 1990s and who is now at the Brennan Center for Justice, noted that law enforcement’s tendency to back off in the face armed right-wing protests was evident in altercations during Trump’s 2016 run for office, and has continued throughout his administration. “To see the police continuing to treat these far-right militants as friendlies is troubling,” he said. During the 1990s, German explained, law enforcement understood that the most violent members of right-wing groups, those with criminal records that exposed them to risk of arrest, did not show up at public protests. That’s no longer the case.

“There are people who have been engaged in protests in Portland for years now,” German said. “They’re well identified. I know them and I don’t live in Portland. Several of them are under court orders not to attend another protest because of the violence they’ve already perpetrated. And yet, they can engage with the police as if they’re auxiliaries. It’s really astonishing — people can point guns at people in broad daylight and not be arrested.”

Data collected by the Center for Analysis of the Radical Right and shared with HuffPost Friday charted nearly 500 instances of right-wing extremists gathering in response to Black Lives Matter protests since the police killing of George Floyd in late May, leading to 64 cases of simple assault, 38 vehicle assaults, and nine cases of shots fired at demonstrators resulting in three deaths.

Among the myriad factors contributing to the political violence and unrest the country is now witnessing is an inversion of the relationship between some elements of the armed right and the federal government, Beirich argued. “The anti-government movement is no longer anti-government in the sense that the federal government is no longer its enemy,” she said. “Trump has changed that calculation — the militias, the larger anti-government world, is essentially a pro-Trump political formation.” German, who published a report this week on extremist infiltration of law enforcement agencies, described the increasingly public alignment of the far right, police on the ground, and the White House as “a widening of the umbrella” for extremist groups.

“The president has identified the Black Lives Matter protests and so-called antifa as the enemy and that sends a message to the police as to who to go after but also to these groups,” he said. “So these groups and the police seem to have aligned on a common enemy, but law enforcement is making a very big mistake if they think that because they are enemies of your enemies, they are your friends. They are not your friends, as they have demonstrated and as they will continue demonstrating as law enforcement tries to regulate their violence.”

A Surge of Far-Right Extremism

The election of Barack Obama was followed by a surge in right-wing extremist activity that then exploded under President Donald Trump, Beirich explained. “There’s been this slow drumbeat of one white supremacist attack or militia anti-government attack, and then another, and then another,” she said. “It just kept accelerating into the explosion that we’ve seen lately.”

In Obama’s second term, the surge in right-wing activity became intermingled with a visible pro-police movement that took hold in response to the Black Lives Matter movement. Rittenhouse came of age during this critical moment. On Wednesday, BuzzFeed News reported that the teenager had a front-row seat at a rally Trump held in January, and was part of a cadet program at a local police department that provided ride-alongs and firearms training. Speaking to Vice News on Thursday, former classmates described Rittenhouse as a “ride or die” Trump supporter who loved “triggering the libs.”

If the notice to appear drawn up by the Antioch Police Department is accurate, Rittenhouse was born on January 3, 2003, late in the 18-month window between the September 11 attacks and the invasion of Iraq. He came into the world just a few weeks before the Department of Homeland Security, and he was likely still in elementary school when the “thin blue line” flag that he included in the background of his Facebook profile became the symbol of a movement forged in reaction to Obama-era police brutality protests.

Posts Rittenhouse made on social media indicate that his worldview was drenched in a militarized culture that has animated large swaths of the country after nearly two decades of war and the emergence of law enforcement as a powerful cultural and political constituency. Embedded in that worldview is a “tactical” community with its own symbols and language, built around the idea of constant threat, good guys versus bad guys, and the sacred role of guns in maintaining social order. In a video taken before Tuesday’s killings, the teenaged Rittenhouse can be heard articulating his role at the protest in terms that echo the language of modern American police, which consistently strives to center police officers’ willingness to run toward danger.

“People are getting injured and our job is to protect this business, and a part of my job is to also help people,” Rittenhouse told a reporter from the right-wing website Daily Caller. “If there’s somebody hurt, I’m running into harm’s way. That’s why I have my rifle because I need to protect myself, obviously, but I also have my med kit.”

If Rittenhouse forged his political identity online in the past half decade, and it appears he did, he would have encountered a largely unchecked universe of blended pro-police and right-wing ideas, memes, and imagery, Beirich noted. “Just remember that none of the social media companies in this kid’s lifetime had really dealt with the issue of militias on their system,” she said. “He would have been exposed to every militant idea — the need for war, arming yourself — all that stuff would have been widespread where kids like this guy lived.”

Online support for Rittenhouse has exploded since his arrest, with fundraisers and “Free Kyle” memes spreading widely against the backdrop of a profoundly fraught political moment.

From the beginning, Trump courted the hard-right edge of American law enforcement, gathering endorsements in his 2016 run for office from unions representing Border Patrol agents, ICE officers, and the Fraternal Order of Police. That courtship has continued into 2020, with the NYPD’s Police Benevolent Association, which represents 24,000 officers, throwing its support behind the president. In Philadelphia earlier this summer, a meeting between Vice President Mike Pence and the local police union also featured members of the Proud Boys, a right-wing street-fighting gang that often shows up at pro-police protests to brawl with leftists.

The killings in Kenosha came one day after a couple from St. Louis, Missouri, who used guns to threaten a Black Lives Matter protest outside their mansion, appeared as speakers at the Republican National Convention. The couple’s message, and the message of the Republicans and the Trump administration as the president seeks reelection, is that the protests that have roiled the country are a threat and that Americans, when threatened, are entitled to defend themselves. “How shocked are we that 17-year-olds with rifles decided they had to maintain order when no one else would?” Fox News host Tucker Carlson told his millions of viewers Wednesday night. Referring to Rittenhouse on Twitter, Ann Coulter, the far-right commentator whose political views Donald Trump is known to consider as bellwether for his base, added: “I want him as my president.”

“That’s the message that’s going to be pounded every day until November 3,” Beirich said — and it should be deeply troubling. “When political figures and public figures take advantage of fraught situations in this way it always ends in violence.” Beirich added, “I can’t think of anything more irresponsible than what the RNC and Trump are doing. It’s unbelievable.”

The bullet that took Anthony Huber’s life pierced his heart, tearing through his aorta, his pulmonary artery, and his right lung. On Wednesday night, Huber’s partner, Hannah Gittings, put out a call to friends to meet at the local skatepark in Kenosha; a GoFundMe launched in his name soon raised thousands of dollars for the family he left behind. In addition to being a talented and known figure in the local skate scene, Huber’s friends remembered him as a “peaceful person” and a “defender” who “put his life on the line for others.” Gittings told a local CBS affiliate that he was the smartest, kindest, and most loving man she ever knew.

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The Atlanta Hawks have announced plans to use their arena as a voting site for upcoming elections. (photo: Kevin C. Cox/Getty Images)
The Atlanta Hawks have announced plans to use their arena as a voting site for upcoming elections. (photo: Kevin C. Cox/Getty Images)


NBA Agrees to Use Arenas as Polling Places in Deal to Resume Playoffs
Samantha Raphelson, NPR
Raphelson writes: "The NBA and its players union announced a plan to use arenas as polling places in the upcoming election as part of an agreement to resume playoff games on Saturday."
READ MORE



A man drinks water in Zgharta district, Lebanon. (photo: Imad Creidi/Reuters)
A man drinks water in Zgharta district, Lebanon. (photo: Imad Creidi/Reuters)


Lebanon: 300,000 People Unable to Access Water After the Blast
teleSUR
Excerpt: "The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) warned on Friday that over 300.000 people in Beirut continue to suffer a lack of access and sanitation services in the aftermath of the blast."

The organization estimates that 130 buildings in the greater Beirut area have been completely disconnected from the main water network. Also, the water systems of more than 500 occupied buildings have been damaged.

The situation is particularly dire for the 100.000 children whose homes were destroyed or affected by the explosion.

The lack of access to safe water poses a more significant threat amid the COVID-19 pandemic as authorities alert that infections "can skyrocket." When the bombs exploded on August 4, the country was already experiencing a rise in infections, according to the World Health Organization.

"As COVID-19 cases continue to surge, it is more critical than ever to ensure that children and families whose lives were turned upside down by the explosion have access to safe water and sanitation," UNICEF Lebanon Representative Yukie Mokuo warns.

On August 7, the United Nations warned of an ongoing humanitarian crisis in a country where one million people were already living below the poverty line and 75 percent of the population needing aid. Besides, 33 percent have lost their jobs since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Following the explosions, the World Food Programme said the damage to Beirut's port, Lebanon's largest, could disrupt food supplies, therefore, increase the prices.

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Blacen Dronet navigates his boat past buildings damaged by Hurricane Laura as he surveys the damage in Hackberry, Louisiana, August 28, 2020. (photo: Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/AFP/Reuters)
Blacen Dronet navigates his boat past buildings damaged by Hurricane Laura as he surveys the damage in Hackberry, Louisiana, August 28, 2020. (photo: Andrew Caballero-Reynolds/AFP/Reuters)


Hundreds of Thousands Still Without Power in Louisiana
CBS News
Excerpt: "The Louisiana coastline devastated by Hurricane Laura has started a long and gloomy recovery as hundreds of thousands of people still without water and power confront the possibility that basic services may not return for weeks - or longer."

More than 400,000 power outages were reported across the state as of early Saturday morning, according to poweroutage.us, which tracks utility reports.

The death toll from Laura continues to climb, with 16 deaths now reported. At least 12 people died in Louisiana and at least four died in Texas, most by trees falling on homes or by carbon monoxide poisoning from generators.

The scope of the destruction is overwhelming. Louisiana Governor John Bel Edwards said in a tweet late Friday the devastation and damage stretch from southwest Louisiana through the northern part of the state.

His office said President Trump approved his request for a major disaster declaration, which will pave the way for getting aid to hard-hit individuals and communities.

In the meantime, the lack of essential resources was grim for the many evacuated residents eager to return. The Louisiana Department of Health estimated Friday that more than 200,000 people were without water. Restoration of those services could take weeks or months, and full rebuilding could take years.

Chad Peterson planned to board up a window and head to Florida. "There's no power. There's no water. There's no utilities," he said.

Thousands of people who heeded dire warnings and fled the Gulf Coast returned to homes without roofs and roads littered with debris. Lawrence "Lee" Faulk came back to a home with no roof in hard-hit Cameron Parish, which was littered with downed power lines. His metal storage building, 24 feet square, was thrown into a neighbor's oak trees.

"We need help," Faulk said. "We need ice, water, blue tarps – everything that you would associate with the storm, we need it. Like two hours ago."

The White House said President Donald Trump would visit the region Saturday and survey the damage.

One of the hardest hit areas was Lake Charles, Louisiana, a city of 80,000 residents. Simply driving there was a feat. Power lines and trees blocked paths or created one-lane roads that drivers had to navigate with oncoming traffic. Street signs were snapped off their perches or dangled, and no stoplights worked, making it a trust exercise with those sharing the roads.

Mayor Nic Hunter cautioned that there was no timetable for restoring electricity and that water-treatment plants "took a beating," resulting in barely a trickle of water coming out of most faucets. "If you come back to Lake Charles to stay, make sure you understand the above reality and are prepared to live in it for many days, probably weeks," Hunter wrote on Facebook.

Caravans of utility trucks were met Friday by thunderstorms in the sizzling heat, complicating recovery efforts.

Forty nursing homes were also relying on generators, and assessments were underway to determine if more than 860 residents in 11 facilities that had been evacuated could return.

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