It's time for a fact-check of another claim to surface in the aftermath of Hurricane Helene. A man who calls himself the Appalachian Prepper on TikTok posted a video last week noting the recent closure of Red Cross shelters in the western part of the state.
Appalachian Prepper: Families staying in these shelters are being told if you don't have a safe place to take your children, you won't be leaving with them. The authorities will keep them. I need you to share, repost and watch this whole video of these families need our help.
Lisa Worf: Similar claims are making their rounds on social media. So just upfront, Paul Specht of WRAL found this to be false. He joins me now. Paul, where did you see this particular claim?
Paul Specht: Now this particular one originated on TikTok but it was shared on multiple platforms including X. And there tens of thousands of people saw this video. And some people said they were alarmed at the prospect that the government or the Red Cross or other authorities might be able to just take custody of children of Helene victims.
Worf: Now, the video cites Red Cross shelters closing that did indeed happen. Are there any other shreds of truth in this video?
Specht: There is a shred of truth to the claim that anyone can file a petition with social services to say, hey, I've seen this child that doesn't appear to have proper shelter or proper food and that you know, if the petition is granted by the courts can lead to an investigation, right? And that's true in any case, whether it's a disaster or not. So with that in the background, we wondered, is this happening in western North Carolina, specifically? Are some of these people in charge of relief? Efforts keeping an eye out for this, or even warning people to find housing before they leave a shelter — and we couldn't find any evidence of that.
Worf: And who did you ask?
Specht: So first we asked the Red Cross and (asked) is finding housing a condition of leaving a Red Cross shelter? And they said no, no it's not.
Then we thought, OK, well, let's reach out to the Department of Health and Human Services — that's the statewide health department. And they said there's no statewide effort to sort of seize custody of children who have lost their homes in Helene. In fact, they said the opposite is true.
They said state lawmakers have approved two disaster relief bills at least at the time that this tweet went out that provide millions of dollars for county governments to help families find shelters or housing programs, or even rental assistance, and things like that. So the priority here is clearly to keep family units together and find them housing together.
But just to be sure, we asked another third-party group that's called Legal Aid of North Carolina. They're a nonprofit that provides free legal services to victims of Helene. And we got a response back from their field manager from Asheville who said not once in his time on the ground there did this question arise. He had not heard one report.
Worf: Now, why do we often see state and government agencies targets of misinformation like this after natural disasters?
Specht: You know, there are a lot of people who just distrust the government, you know, and any form. And we've seen lots of claims here at PolitiFact that the hurricane offered an opportunity for the government to seize land or seize people's properties. And, you know, this is sort of an extension of that although also seize your kids.
You know, in some cases, I suspect that these are misunderstandings of what's actually happening on the ground here with this man who is the Appalachian Prepper. He was offering to help people find housing, which is certainly a noble effort here. It's possible that, you know, someone just relayed just bad information to him as well.
These fact checks are a collaboration between PolitiFact and WRAL. And you can hear them on Wednesdays on Morning Edition.
