Trump Calls Puerto Rico Leadership ‘Corrupt’ After Protests

(Bloomberg) -- President Donald Trump weighed in on the scandal and protests enveloping the government of Puerto Rico, saying in a pair of tweets that “a lot of bad things are happening” in the U.S. territory and that its leadership is “corrupt.”

He also again exaggerated the amount of U.S. aid provided after Hurricane Maria devastated the island and killed thousands of people in 2017. Congress has allocated $42.5 billion for reconstruction but Puerto Rico has so far received only about $13.6 billion.

Protests have raged in San Juan since Sunday, after local news outlets published chat messages between Governor Ricardo Rossello and his aides in which they used misogynistic language and disparaged their political opponents and ordinary Puerto Ricans.

U.S. Representative Raul Grijalva, a Democrat who chairs the House committee that oversees the island, has called for Rossello to resign.

To contact the reporter on this story: Michelle Kaske in New York at mkaske@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Alex Wayne at awayne3@bloomberg.net, Justin Blum

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