Perhaps 5,000 people died in Puerto Rico in 2017 for reasons related to September's Hurricane Maria, according to a study that dismisses the official death toll of 64 as "a substantial underestimate."

     The mayor of San Juan, Puerto Rico, shot back at President Donald Trump minutes after his Thursday morning (Sept. 13, 2018) claim that the death toll from 2017’s Hurricane Maria was grossly inflated.
     Trump’s denial that nearly 3,000 people died as a result of the September 2017 storm, determined by a government report, amounts to “denial following neglect,” Mayor Carmen Yulín Cruz tweeted. Trump blamed Democrats for reporting large figures in order to make him look bad.
    “YOUR LACK OF RESPECT IS APPALLING!” the mayor continued. She called Trump “delusional, paranoid, and unhinged from any sense of reality,” and “so vain he thinks this is about him.”