Rubio says US willing to help, but not actively assisting yet (2025)

Mar 31, 12:28 pm

Rubio says US willing to help, but not actively assisting yet

Secretary of State Marco Rubio posted about the potential U.S. response to the earthquake, and seemed to suggest the president meant the U.S. was willing to help rather than actively assisting.

"My prayers go out to the people of Burma and Thailand who are impacted by the earthquake," he wrote. "We've been in contact with these countries and, as @POTUS said, stand ready to provide assistance."

Rubio also confirmed the State Department’s teams in the impacted countries were safe and accounted for.

The U.S. Embassy in Myanmar has suspended nonemergency consular services for the time being. The U.S. mission to Thailand has not reported any disruption in services.
-ABC News' Shannon K. Kingston

State Department 'evaluating the need' for earthquake response

State Department spokesperson Tammy Bruce said despite the tumult at the U.S. Agency for International Development, the U.S. has maintained "a team of disaster experts with the capacity to respond if disaster strikes," which are commonly referred to as DART teams.

"These expert teams provide immediate assistance, including food and safe drinking water needed aftermath of a disaster. The United States is evaluating the need for assistance based on requests and dynamic reporting,” she said. [14:47:29]

But despite President Donald Trump's assertion that the U.S. is going to be helping, Bruce suggested the State Department was still in standby mode.

"What I can tell you is that we wait for formal requests," she said. "We are ready. Obviously, we are watching what is transpiring."

Bruce insisted that despite the funding flip-flops and reorganization of USAID, "there has been no impact on our ability to perform those duties, those requests for aid, if and when they come in."

-ABC News' Shannon K. Kingston

American recounts being stranded after earthquake

An American who was on a subway train in Bangkok when the earthquake struck recounted being stranded as transportation in the city ground to a halt.

When her train stopped, Sid Simone said she went on Facebook to find out what was going on.

"I saw 'earthquake in Bangkok,' and so at that point, I knew that the entire city was going to start to diminish," the Michigan native told ABC Grand Rapids affiliate WZZM in an interview earlier Friday. "I have been trying to get home for five hours now."

With no train service, Simone, who is in Bangkok to make a documentary on vegan food, said she got into a taxi but abandoned it when traffic came to a standstill and the vehicle was low on gas.

WZZM spoke to her as she was walking along a highway, still about an hour from home.

"It's unfortunate because there's so many people that, we're all fighting trying to get home, but some people are trying to fight to get home because their family member is under that building, you know. Somebody didn't make it home," she told WZZM.

She told the station that her apartment complex was just down the street from where the under-construction high-rise collapsed.

"I was so blessed that I was not there today," she said. “I could have been shopping in that area."

Trump: 'We're going to be helping'

Asked about the Myanmar earthquake during a press event at the White House, U.S. President Donald Trump said, "We're going to be helping."

"It's terrible what's happened," he said. "We've already spoken with the country."

Trump did not elaborate on how the U.S. plans to send foreign aid.