Rove: Bush administration 'fulfilled' it's Katrina responsibilities

March 02, 2009
By David Edwards
Karl Rove blamed Louisianas former Democratic Governor for failures during Katrina and absolved the Bush Administration. The government official who was responsible for managing Katrina under the Stafford Act was the governor of Louisiana and she lost office in large measure due to the poor quality of her performance, Rove said.

Katrina vanden Heuvel saw a failure in the Bush administrations handling of Katrina. I think many thought that Katrina was the bookend to Iraq, vanden Heuvel said. Thats when millions of Americans, left or right, woke up to the incompetence of an administration that had worked hard to diminish government as a force for good.

With all due respect, the federal governments responsibilities were met under Katrina which were to provide the immediate assistance, to pluck people off of the roofs, said Rove.

Rove made the comments during an webcast on ABCNews.com.