"I will do what I never thought I was going to do.
I am begging, begging anyone who can hear us to save us from dying.
If anybody out there is listening to us, we are dying, and you are killing us with the inefficiency," Carmen Yulín Cruz said on Friday.
Aid has been slow to arrive to residents on the island, who are in increasingly dire need of food, water and medicine.
The Trump administration has come under fierce scrutiny from Puerto Ricans and lawmakers for not helping the U.S. territory quickly enough.
The president insisted on Friday afternoon federal officials were doing a great job with relief efforts.
"We have done an incredible job, considering there's absolutely nothing to work with," Trump told reporters at the White House. »