G20 draws attention to rival recovery narratives in Western NC

Asheville is buzzing with finance officials, central bank governors and journalists from across the globe this week. The city is hosting a G20 summit — specifically the G20 Finance Track. G20 stands for the Group of 20, which is a conglomerate of 20 countries with the largest economies in the world, including 19 individual nations, the European Union and the African Union. 

The US Treasury Department says it chose Asheville because of the region’s recovery from Tropical Storm Helene, which occurred nearly two years ago. The Trump administration has framed the G20 in Asheville as a celebration of a supposedly completed recovery. Kush Desai, the president’s senior deputy press secretary, likened Asheville to a phoenix rising from the ashes in conversation with Carolina Public Press. US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent recognized Asheville’s “comeback story” while delivering remarks at the summit. 

But Asheville is just one city in Western North Carolina’s span of 18 counties and the Qualla Boundary, and even parts of Asheville, like the River Arts District and Biltmore Village, have not been fully rebuilt. 

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Rural parts of the region that are still in the thick of recovery have seldom been a topic of discussion at the international event. Lagging federal funding for the $60 billion disaster hasn’t been either. 

“The selection of historic Asheville reflects the Trump Administration’s commitment to the revitalization and resilience of western North Carolina, which continues to rebuild after the devastating impact of Helene,” Secretary Bessent said in an August press release. Bessent owns a home in Cashiers, in Jackson County, a wealthy rural mountain community about an hour southwest of Asheville. Damage from Helene in Cashiers was minimal.

Other rural communities were both hit harder and facing a more difficult recovery. The Hickory Nut Gorge, which includes the communities of Lake Lure, Chimney Rock, Bat Cave and Gerton, in Rutherford, Henderson and Buncombe counties, is still experiencing repairs on the main road that connects them to one another and larger communities like Asheville and Hendersonville. 

US Sen. Ted Budd, R-Advance, attended the G20 on Tuesday, but told Carolina Public Press that after the event he would be traveling around Bat Cave and surveying lingering damage to the community. 

Secretary Bessent began his remarks on Monday by saying Asheville was chosen for its physical beauty and the community’s resilience — before noting that economic growth and “America First” were the foremost priorities of the economic summit. The Treasury Department secured the entire property of the landmark Omni Grove Park Inn for the conference. Other G20 meetings are also occurring simultaneously in the Triangle this week. 

Is WNC really a beacon of recovery?

When Tropical Storm Helene initially hit Western North Carolina nearly two years ago, Congress went home instead of authorizing federal funding for the disaster. It was an election year, which politicized the storm on a national level. 

Helene’s damages amount to roughly $60 billion. Only 16% of recovery has been funded thus far, according to the Governor’s Recovery Office from Western North Carolina. 

In June, NC Gov. Josh Stein, a Democrat, requested $10 billion more from Congress for Helene Recovery, which has yet to be addressed. North Carolina has funded roughly $5.3 billion in recovery, while the federal government has supposedly funded $9.5 billion, with a large amount of those federal dollars yet to be disbursed. 

Budd told CPP that he will not support disaster relief packages that do not include Western North Carolina. Earlier this summer, he stated that he would vote against a supplemental relief request from the Office of Management and Budget that would provide aid to farmers in Florida, but not North Carolina. 

The senator also said he and Stein have continual conversations about Helene recovery and “what that number needs to be.” At the same time, Budd praised FEMA under Trump.

Immediately after Helene initially hit Western North Carolina in September 2024, then-presidential candidate Trump claimed that FEMA was only distributing $750 to those affected by the disaster. The $750 was what is called Serious Needs Assistance, which was an initial direct payment for people affected by the storm for things like food, water and other basics. He also claimed that FEMA money was spent on undocumented migrants instead of disaster aid and that helicopters were not allowed into disaster zones after the storm. 

Each of those assertions was shown to be false prior to the November election in which Trump was elected, winning both North Carolina and most of its heavily Republican mountain counties where the impact of Helene was hardest.

Trump cancelled a $7.7 million grant this year for rural parts of the state that would fund broadband and veterans’ affairs as a way to shrink federal expenditures. His administration also denied the state’s request for cost sharing at the federal level that Biden had approved.

At G20, Treasury officials remarked on the $5 billion that the Trump administration has secured for Helene in a call to the press before the G20. They brought up the billions of dollars that the whole state of North Carolina has seen since 2025, not just the western part of the state. FEMA and the delay for disbursements from the federal agency were not mentioned during the call. 

Budd called FEMA a “calcified” agency because of how long it takes for communities to get relief. The agency requires municipalities to pay for repairs before reimbursing them, which can take years. It also requires an extensive documentation process to be reimbursed for these costs — governments have to take pictures of trucks loading up debris and report where the debris ends up, and so on.  

“The fastest response is from neighbors helping neighbors, communities helping communities, volunteers flying in doing the initial recovery,” Budd said. “You cannot have a calcified organization responding to urgent needs.”

He also told CPP that the G20 pertains to Helene recovery because the war in Iran and increasing energy prices are making it more expensive for those in still-struggling communities. He did not comment on how climate change may cause future storms like Helene and instead said the region needs lower energy prices to make rebuilding affordable. 

‘We’re not on our feet’

Banners reading, “Planet over Profits,” and “Workers over Billionaires,” lined parts of Asheville this weekend. The city is the one Democratic bastion in otherwise conservative Western North Carolina and messaging about Helene recovery displayed the $60 billion figure. Demonstrations lined downtown, as well as Merrimon Avenue in North Asheville. Folks sang and chanted, and in a very Asheville fashion, there was a puppet show. 

Community members, including organizers from the NC Poor People’s Campaign, held protests across Asheville the week before the G20. Some organizers were frustrated with the Trump administration’s claims about Helene recovery; others were displeased with the amount of wealth on display at the event. 

Leslie Boyd, a chair with the Poor People’s Campaign, said folks in Western North Carolina just want enough money to finish the job of recovery and seeing government officials come into town and talk about billion-dollar investments abroad is frustrating. One of the hot-button topics at the G-20 is the war with Iran.

“We’ve only struggled to our knees; we’re not on our feet,” she said of Western North Carolina. 

There was a community vigil in Pack Square Park on Sunday that was in part a protest against the summit and also in remembrance of the approaching two-year anniversary of Helene. Activists like Boyd echoed the sentiment that nonprofits and community groups acted as first responders after the initial disaster. 

Members of the Asheville Food and Beverage United, the local union for service workers, tabled at the vigil, along with other local organizations like Sunrise Movement and Firestorm Books. Bobby Skelton, a member of the union, said that the bulk of Helene recovery has been community members looking out for each other.

Western North Carolina nonprofits and disaster relief organizations received millions of donations after the storm but suffered extensive damage to their physical structures as well as staffing cuts from the federal level in 2025, according to a report authored by Dogwood Health Trust. 

Money is still coming in, but not at the rate that many locals would like. 

“The narrative right now from the G20 is that Asheville is so proud of its full recovery and the government helped,” Boyd said. “That’s all a lie.”

G20 Hallmark Growth and WNC

Though the event is largely self-contained to the Grove Park Inn, Explore Asheville CEO Vic Isley said she expects it to bring Asheville and greater Buncombe County $2 million in local spending. Treasury officials also said in a call to the press on Aug. 27 that the G20 will also bring additional millions in earned media coverage, which is the publicity that the city will receive from coverage.  

“In some cases, organizations seek us out, as Secretary Bessent did with bringing the G20 Finance Track to Asheville and being part of our economic comeback,” Isley said. 

Tourism in Asheville and the larger Buncombe County has been stronger this year than last. Prior to Helene, tourism accounted for about 20% of the county’s GDP, and Isley said spending is slowly returning to normal. She compared recovery to a continuum — different parts of Western North Carolina are recovering drastically differently, with places like the community of Swannanoa in Buncombe County that are still undergoing repairs on their infrastructure. Carolina Public Press previously reported on lasting food deserts in the region, after Helene flooded grocery stores. 

While minimal statistics are available about tourism’s rebound throughout the region, places that were hard-hit by Helene are facing unprecedented job losses, as well as unmet housing needs, according to the NC Budget and Tax Center. Boyd said she worries that the money brought to Asheville during the G20 won’t go to small businesses that still need disaster relief. Small businesses cannot receive aid from FEMA, but the Small Business Administration offers low-interest loans for businesses after natural disasters. Still, it’s been difficult for small businesses to bounce back after Helene. 

Chris Pilkerton, the assistant secretary for the Treasury and former acting administrator of the Small Business Administration, told CPP that the SBA usually comes in after FEMA and that folks can still take advantage of these loans after Helene. 

“These are very long-term loans with very low interest rates and the idea of these is to help small businesses build back up,” he said. 

Who attended G20? What did they discuss? 

Every year, a different member country hosts the G20 presidency, which means it hosts a series of summits for the G20, and this year, it’s the United States’ turn. Meetings are taking place across the country, with one in Miami that the president will attend.  

Its theme is growth, and hot topics of conversation include the war in Iran, financial regulation worldwide, bond markets, as well as the U.S. $40 trillion national debt. 

Asheville is hosting the yearly G20 Finance Track, which includes finance ministers, central bank governors and senior officials meeting together to coordinate economic and monetary policy among member countries. Chapel Hill is also hosting a G20 Innovation Ministerial, which will bring tech leaders like OpenAI’s Sam Altman to the Carolina Inn this week. Elon Musk will be joining the event virtually.

President Trump specifically barred South Africa, which hosted last year’s G20 events, from attending the summit in Asheville because of the alleged persecution of White Afrikaners in the nation. Russia’s finance minister also joined this year’s summit, which shocked other attending countries, according to reporting from national news outlets like Reuters and the New York Times. 

This is the first time a public-private partnership has been at this meeting, which has historically consisted only of government officials. Several Fortune 500 executives are in attendance at the finance track, including representatives from Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan and Chase and pharmaceutical company Eli Lilly, according to reporting from Axios. Roughly 1,000 people were expected to attend, including 200 journalists from across the globe, according to ExploreAsheville. 

Some journalists from the New York Times, Bloomberg and the Wall Street Journal were barred from attending the event. The Asheville Watchdog, a local investigative outlet, was also denied credentials for the event. 

While G20 is wrapping up, Helene recovery conversations will stay in the minds of communities in Western North Carolina and their leaders for the foreseeable future. In North Carolina’s 11th congressional district, which encompasses a large amount of Western NC, Democrat Jamie Ager and Republican State Rep. Jennifer Balkcom, R-Hendersonville, are running a race largely on who will better deliver recovery funds to the region. 

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