Trump to tour tornado devastation in Alabama

Author: Associated Press
Published:
A fallen cell tower lies across U.S. Route 280 highway in Lee County, Ala., in the Smiths Station community after what appeared to be a tornado struck in the area Sunday, March 3, 2019. Severe storms destroyed mobile homes, snapped trees and left a trail of destruction amid weather warnings extending into Georgia, Florida and South Carolina, authorities said. (Mike Haskey/Ledger-Enquirer via AP)

President Donald Trump is heading to Alabama to survey damage from a deadly tornado outbreak that devastated a small town, killing nearly two dozen people.

Trump is expected to tour rural Lee County in eastern Alabama, where 23 people died Sunday in an E4 tornado that carved a path of destruction nearly a mile wide.

It was one of at least 36 tornadoes confirmed to have touched down across the Southeast in a deadly weekend outbreak.

Trump has said he’s instructed the Federal Emergency Management Agency to give Alabama “the A Plus treatment” as the state recovers, marking the latest example of Trump’s differing rhetoric concerning states that voted for and against him.

Trump had already been scheduled to fly south Friday for a weekend at his private Mar-a-Lago club.

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