President Trump Says Puerto Rico Is 'In Deep Trouble ... With Billions Of Dollars Owed To Wall Street'

WASHINGTON, DC — As millions of people are struggling to obtain the basics of daily life in Puerto Rico, President Trump has been stirring up the culture wars on the mainland by blasting NFL players who choose to protest police brutality and racial prejudice during the national anthem. Critics of the president lambasted Trump for tweeting multiple times about the NFL and other sports over the weekend while not mentioning the continuing strife in the largest U.S. island territory.

On Monday night, the president took to Twitter to address the aftermath of Hurricane Maria. The power is still out across nearly all of Puerto Rico after the storm smashed poles, snarled power lines and flooded electricity-generating plants last Wednesday, knocking out a grid that was already considered antiquated compared to the U.S. mainland. (For more information on this and other political stories, subscribe to the White House Patch to receive daily newsletters and breaking news alerts.)

Watch: Trump says Puerto Rico is in 'deep trouble' after hurricanes

However, some observers found it odd that Trump chose to unnecessarily bring up the fact that Puerto Rico is also struggling with a massive debt crisis:

Julián Castro, the former secretary of Housing and Urban Development, denounced the president's comments.

"Donald Trump has terribly failed our fellow Americans in Puerto Rico," Castro tweeted. "His words and his incompetence disgrace our nation."

On Tuesday morning, Trump announced he will be visiting the island next week.

“Puerto Rico needs a lot of money," the president told reporters. "I am going to Puerto Rico on Tuesday."

Generators are providing power to the fortunate few in Puerto Rico who have them, but nearly all the island's 1.6 million electricity customers were still without power Monday and facing many, many hot days and dark nights to come. Power had been restored to a handful of hospitals and surrounding areas by Monday afternoon, but Public Affairs Secretary Ramon Rosario said it will take months to fully restore power to the island.

Authorities are still figuring out the extent of the damage, let alone beginning to repair it.

Puerto Rico's power plants were not severely damaged, according to Gov. Ricardo Rossello. However, 80 percent of the island's transmission lines are down, and Rossello said it would take up to two years to completely rebuild the infrastructure under normal conditions. He said the plan is to restore power with some quick fixes to the network and then gradually strengthen it to avoid problems like blackouts and make it less vulnerable to future storms.

A long delay will mean even more pain for a Puerto Rican economy that's already reeling from a decade-long recession. With no power, even more people will leave the island to find better opportunities on the mainland and further drain its workforce. The downed power system is also damaging the tourism industry, which contributed 8 percent to Puerto Rico's economy last year.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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