Helene recovery efforts continue; Biden orders another 500 active-duty troops for western NC

The United States Department of Agriculture approved North Carolina to allow current Food and Nutrition Services participants in 23 western state counties to receive 70% of the monthly September benefit back on their EBT card, the NC Department of Health and Human Services said Sunday.

This includes Alexander, Alleghany, Ashe, Avery, Buncombe, Burke, Caldwell, Cleveland, Gaston, Haywood, Henderson, Jackson, Lincoln, Macon, Madison, McDowell, Mitchell, Polk, Rutherford, Transylvania, Watauga, Wilkes, and Yancey counties.

The benefit replacement is automatic and does not require action from the participant. NCDHHS said this will impact 200,000 people in NC and more than $24 million in replacement benefits.

The department also received approval for participants to temporarily use benefits to purchase hot food from EBT retailers using their cards. This will last through Nov. 3 statewide and do not have to apply for the benefit.

NCDHHS is working with USDA to receive federal authority to operate a Disaster Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program.

Around 125,000 are still without power across North Carolina one week after Helene swept through the state

According to Duke Energy, in western North Carolina, restoration "may be extended in particular areas where catastrophic damage has occurred to electrical infrastructures, roads/bridges, or both."

"We've never had anything like this. Never. I've talked with guys who have been 40, 50 years in this field, each one of them says never before," Duke Energy spokesperson Bill Norton told WLOS last week.

The Department of Transportation announced Saturday it is sending $100 million in emergency funds to help repair roads and bridges in North Carolina.

This comes after the state suffered extensive damage from Hurricane Helene.

Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg called the emergency aid an initial road of funding. He said the goal is to get roads repaired and reopened quickly.

The government is using the Federal Highway Administration's Emergency Relief Program money to pay for repairs.

CNN contributed to this report.

The facts emerging from Hurricane Helene's destruction are heartrending: Businesses and homes destroyed, whole communities nearly wiped out, hundreds of lives lost, hundreds of people missing.

Yet this devastation and despair is not enough for the extremist groups, disinformation agents, hucksters and politicians who are exploiting the disaster to spread false claims and conspiracy theories about it and the government's response.

According to former President Donald Trump, the federal government is intentionally withholding aid to Republican disaster victims. Far-right extremist groups warn on social media that officials plan to bulldoze affected communities and seize the land from residents. A tale straight from science fiction asserts that Washington used weather control technology to steer Helene toward Republican voters to tilt the presidential election toward Democratic nominee Kamala Harris.

The claims, according to experts and local officials dealing with disaster response, say less about the reality of the widespread damage from Helene than they do about America's fractured politics and the fear and distrust shadowing an election year marked by assassination attempts and escalating global tension.

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