Obama orders $100 million in aid to Haiti

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President Obama, signaling ‘one of the largest relief efforts in history’ for victims of the earthquake in Haiti, said today that he has ordered an immediate investment of $100 million in U.S. aid.

‘This investment will grow over the coming year,’ said the president, standing with several Cabinet members and the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, whom Obama said he has ordered to make the disaster in the Haitian capital of Port-au-Prince the No. 1 priority of all their agencies.

U.S. armed forces are on the way to Haiti, the president said, citing several Coast Guard cutters already deployed, element of the Army’s 82nd Airborne Division and a Marine Expeditionary Force en route.

‘The losses that have been suffered in Haiti are nothing less than devastating,’ Obama said, promising not only the ‘power’ of the U.S. military for a massive relief effort, but also ‘the compassion’ of the American people.

Read more about the president’s statement here.

-- Mark Silva

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