This afternoon, our editor texted the following letter in response to President Joe Biden’s text about federal disaster response on Monday. The letter was drafted after the White House posted a memorandum on fighting Hurricane Helene falsehoods with facts.

While the effort to use WhiteHouse.gov was worthy, the “opt-in texts” from POTUS referenced are woefully inadequate to the wicked challenge that lies and conspiracy theories pose for federal, state, and local agencies engaged in rescue and recovery operations.

We hope President Biden uses the National Wireless Emergency Alert System to text every American in the regions devasted by Hurricane Helene links to DisasterAssistance.gov, the FEMA app, and 80016213362.

It is legal to send a Presidential alert to “alert and warn the civilian population in areas endangered by natural disasters.” The President should do so to serve and protect the Americans who need trustworthy information and access to services.

E Pluribus Unum.

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Dear President Biden,

Thank you for helping Americans affected by Hurricane Helene, President Biden. Could you please direct your team to surge connectivity & trustworthy information to everyone in the path of this disaster?

Your team is engaging Americans on social media, but I fear people without cell service or data can’t get info or access services.

The escalating impact of the information void that’s been left behind in the hurricane’s wake risks further damaging public trust in our democracy of, by, and for all of the American people. You’ve seen it and then spoken about the doubt, fear, and lies being used to divide our union as we begin casting our ballots in a historic election.

The White House communication team has put out a memo correcting the record and worked with FEMA to stand up a new website to debunk rumors about disaster response, as CISA did for rumors and conspiracies about election integrity in 2020, but it’s not enough.

Those efforts have run the same playbook that failed to combat a disinformation campaign that has successfully led tens of millions of Americans to hold false beliefs about the integrity of the election that sent you to the White House or the safety of the vaccines that have saved hundreds of millions of lives in the pandemic.

To beat the Authoritarian Playbook, you and your team need to come up with new plays from a democratic playbook that you co-create and run with federal, state and local governments agencies to reach the American people you seek to serve and protect.

First, get us all online. Partner with every American company who’s willing to work with the U.S. government to provide open Internet access to people in the disaster zones. Literally surge power and connectivity to all affected counties. Challenge American industry to deliver better hand-cranked & pedaled dynamos to charge batteries that can power radios & phones.

Second, wake the sleeping giant. FEMA is already working full-out with state and local agencies, but talk with governors and mayors about how more
members of the National Guard and U.S. military assets could be deployed in ways that rebuild trust with affected communities who are being told that the U.S. government and other Americans “hate them” and aren’t helping them.

Take away poisonous talking points about humanitarian aid being sent to help people caught in wars and disasters aboard by further mobilizing first responders across our great nation to bring help, health, and hope to Appalachian foothills and rural coastlines.

Create a shared ethos of “showing your work” in these response efforts. Embrace community news, public broadcasting, and civic media to create a powerful shared narrative around collective facts, where trust is built by participation and collaboration.

Third, empower Americans to help one another and keep validating those efforts by standing with governors and mayors. Show patriotism has no party and partisanship has no place in disaster response. You know we will rise to the occasion if you ask us what we will do for our country and give us ways to serve. You’ve already stood up a climate corps and institutionalized digital government fellowships.

Call on Congress to fund the next generation of first responders who can not only help respond to the decades of natural disasters ahead but build resilience in the most marginalized communities who will be disproportionately affected by hurricanes, wildfires, & droughts that lie ahead.

Fourth, restore trust in the rule of law. Partisans are falsely claiming that you have weaponized federal law enforcement against your political enemies. Your considered decision not to comment on ongoing investigations has allowed public understanding of how a former president conspired to overturn the results of a free and fair election with lies and abuses of power.

Declassify and disclose what the United States government knows about the foreign entanglements of our politicians now, so that all Americans are armed with the self-knowledge a healthy democracy requires.

Decry corruption as a pernicious blight upon liberal democracy. Members of your own party have been convicted of bribery by foreign governments, or stand indicted.

Make it clear to Americans that while all of us are entitled to due process and the presumption of innocence, public service is a public trust. Patriotism knows no party.

Finally, come meet us where we are, online and offline. Years of advancing truth decay have left far too many Americans infected with viral lies, increasingly vulnerable to the weapons of mass doubt, denial, distraction, deception, & disinformation wielded by those who would weaken our union and undermine public trust and faith in democracy itself.

Go far beyond fact sheets and tweets. Use online and offline participatory forums hosted with leaders from across the spectrum of American society to combat the epidemic of loneliness, fear, and disillusion that we can see infecting minds, weakening hearts, and breaking spirits across our union.

Remember how President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s fireside chats built trust during the Great Depression. Run that play with today’s emerging technologies, in partnership with public media.

As you know, the stakes are existential for our union. Every American will suffer if we do not find a way to help a house divided stand together after the last ballots are cast a month from today.

While we have not been able to solve the wicked challlenge of broken public trust these past three years, I’m certain that the months ahead are a historic opportunity to show the world that there is nothing the United States cannot do if we, the people, decided to do it together.

Thank you for all that you have done to protect and defend the Constitution over half a century of public service.

With charity to all and malice to none,

Alexander B. Howard