NEW YORK -- President Joe Biden declared climate change "everybody's crisis" Tuesday after touring two northeastern states ravaged by the remnants of Hurricane Ida, and said it's time for America to get serious about the danger or face ever worse loss of life and property.
The words came as his administration prepared to ask Congress for billions in federal aid to respond to last week's storm and other natural disasters.
Biden, in his second Ida-related visit in less than a week, used his trip to press for robust action to combat climate change and focus attention on his expansive domestic infrastructure agenda in Congress. Predicting that natural disasters will continue to occur with "more frequency and ferocity," Biden said the "nation and the world are in peril," and implored passage of his "Build Back Better" plan, which will be drafted on Capitol Hill this month and is expected to include funding to deal with the warming planet.
In his visits Tuesday, Biden also referred to findings from a Washington Post report that said nearly 1 in 3 Americans live in a county hit by a weather disaster in the past three months -- illustrating the expansive reach of the destruction wrought by climate change.
"Folks, the evidence is clear. Climate change poses an existential threat to our lives, to our economy, and the threat is here. It's not going to get any better," Biden said in New York after he toured a street in Queens torn up by Ida.
"We can't turn it back very much, but we can prevent it from getting worse," he said. Biden added that scientists have been warning for decades that this day would come and that urgent action was needed.
"We don't have any more time," he said.
Though the damage caused by Ida was the prime focus Tuesday, Biden also highlighted other recent natural devastations such as the wildfires in the West, which have burned millions of acres.
Throughout the day, Biden repeatedly warned that no area of the country is immune from the destructive impact of climate change -- saying in Queens that "it's about time we stop the regional fights."
"This is not a situation that's going to go away," said New York Gov. Kathy Hochul, a Democrat, who was among the many state and federal officials who accompanied Biden on Tuesday. "The way I operate, I'm acting as if this same event could happen again in 10 more days."
Biden struck a similar theme before he toured Manville, N.J., also ravaged by severe flooding caused by Ida.
"Every part of the country, every part of the country is getting hit by extreme weather," Biden said in a briefing at the Somerset County emergency management training center attended by federal, state and local officials, including New Jersey Gov. Phil Murphy.
In Manville, a small borough bordered by two rivers that have been prone to flooding after major storms, Biden shook hands and chatted with residents, and embraced a young child who had handed the president a note.
As he walked the route, he was taunted by supporters of Republican former President Donald Trump, who yelled that Biden was a "tyrant" and worse. Biden did not look in their direction.
Lou DeFazio, a contractor and three-decade resident of Manville, sat on his porch with a small Trump flag waving beside him and Kaycee, his dog barking through an open window. DeFazio said the town needs better planning instead of presidential visits.
"I think their efforts could be better spent in other areas. I don't know what they're gonna do for us," he said.
Asked by reporters about the scope of the flood damage in Manville, Biden said he saw water marks that were as high as the windows of the homes.
"Literally over your head," Biden noted.
RESPONSE AID
In tandem with Biden's trip Tuesday, administration officials said the White House plans to ask Congress for at least $24 billion in additional federal aid to respond to hurricanes, wildfires, earthquakes and natural disasters dating back to early last year.
Of that preliminary figure, more than $14 billion is needed to assist various states that are still recovering from catastrophic weather events separate from Ida. On Ida specifically, the administration estimated that at least another $10 billion will be necessary, although that number is likely to climb higher as officials continue to survey the damage.
"Given the scale and scope of these natural disasters, everyone must work together to get Americans the help they desperately need," said Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., who also accompanied Biden in Queens.
The administration is asking lawmakers to include those additional dollars in legislation that must pass before the end of September to continue operating the federal government -- adding another dilemma this month to a Congress that is already trying to not only craft Biden's ambitious legislative agenda but to perform the basic functions of government.
In addition to averting a government shutdown, Congress must lift the government's borrowing limit in the coming weeks to avoid defaulting on federal debt.
Democrats have indicated that they want to handle both government funding and the debt limit in one package this month. Including disaster aid for Ida in that bill -- the strategy outlined by the Biden administration Tuesday -- could make it more difficult for GOP lawmakers from hard-hit states to oppose the measure.
To that end, a half-dozen House Republicans representing Louisiana, as well as the state's two GOP senators, wrote to the White House last week, asking for emergency supplemental aid -- a package that would be independent of must-pass government funding due by Sept. 30.
Ida, which came ashore as a Category 4 hurricane, killed dozens of people across the Gulf Coast and in the Northeast, including at least 50 people in six Eastern states. More than half of the deaths, 27, were recorded in New Jersey. In New York City, 13 people were killed, including 11 in Queens.
POWER WOES LINGER
Hundreds of thousands of homes and businesses in Louisiana, most of them outside New Orleans, still didn't have power Tuesday, and more than half of the gas stations in two major cities were without fuel nine days after Hurricane Ida slammed into the state, splintering homes and toppling electric lines.
There were also continuing signs of recovery, however, as the total number of people without electricity has fallen from more than a million at its peak, while hundreds of thousands of people have had their water restored.
State health officials, meanwhile, announced that they are revoking the licenses of seven nursing homes that evacuated residents to a warehouse where seven residents died amid deteriorating conditions after the hurricane.
The disparity in power restoration between New Orleans, where nearly three-fourths of the city had electricity again, and other communities where almost all residents were still in the dark prompted frustration and finger-pointing.
State Rep. Tanner Magee, the House's second-ranking Republican who lives in the devastated city of Houma in Terrebonne Parish, said he's convinced that his region is being shortchanged in favor of New Orleans.
"It's very infuriating to me," Magee said.
Though water was running again in his area, most hospitals in the region remained closed, and the parish was in desperate need of temporary shelter for first responders and others vital to the rebuilding effort, he said.
Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards, a Democrat, said that while there had been much progress in restoring water and power, "there's an awful lot of work to be done."
Information for this article was contributed by Seung Min Kim of The Washington Post; and by Aamer Madhani, Darlene Superville, Michael Catalini, Kevin McGill, Melinda Deslatte, Rebecca Santana, Jeff Martin, Sudhin Thanawala and Lisa J. Adams Wagner of The Associated Press.