PHILADELPHIA - Xavier Totti moved to the mainland United States from his native Puerto Rico 43 years ago. He is still asked routinely if he is "legal," and when he mails packages to relatives back home, he has to fill out an international form.

So, the 65-year-old anthropologist was not surprised by a Morning Consult-New York Times poll that showed more than half of Americans don't realize that Puerto Rico is a U.S. territory - and that its residents are U.S. citizens.

"By now, it's sort of comical, but it makes me feel second-class, like you don't belong," said Totti, who lives in New York City.

Many Puerto Ricans share that view - a sentiment reinforced by what critics say has been a slow federal response to the humanitarian crisis that descended on Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria devastated the island.

"The response from Congress ... has been almost as if Puerto Rico did not exist," said Jose Cruz, a political scientist at the University at Albany-State University of New York. His mother and sister live on the island.

President Donald Trump's response "has been inadequate," Cruz said. "He should have been there last week. Puerto Rico is not a priority."

The president is slated to visit the island on Tuesday. He said Saturday that he would also "hopefully be able to stop at the U.S. Virgin Islands," where 100,000 U.S. citizens are also struggling to recover from storm devastation.

Parallels to Katrina

Trump announced the visit after being criticized for going days without tweeting about the Puerto Rican crisis. When he did mention it on Monday, he referred to the island's "broken infrastructure & massive debt," its old electrical grid being "in terrible shape" and "billions of dollars owed to Wall Street and the banks which, sadly, must be dealt with."

FEMA, the agency heading relief efforts, has sent at least 150 containers filled with relief supplies to the port of San Juan since the storm struck. Earlier this week, White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said 10,000 government workers are on the ground helping Puerto Rico recover.

Some lawmakers drew parallels between the federal government's responses to Maria and Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans in 2005.

"This is Katrina 2017. Let there be no misunderstanding about that," Illinois Democrat Luis Gutierrez said Wednesday.

A different response

Puerto Ricans have been recognized as U.S. citizens for a century. A majority of them - roughly 5 million - live in the United States, while an estimated 3.4 million live on the island. Puerto Ricans living on the mainland can vote for president in the general election every four years, yet residents of the island cannot, nor do they have voting representation in Congress.

Carmen Febo San Miguel, a doctor in Philadelphia and executive director of Taller Puertorriqueno, said she followed media coverage of hurricanes Harvey, Irma and Maria over the past month, including a telethon for victims of Harvey that raised millions of dollars, and wondered where such efforts were for her home.

"If Puerto Rico was a state in the United States, the response would be very different," said Febo San Miguel, whose organization uses art to promote development within the Philadelphia Latino community. "We are compatriots. This situation has brought to the surface in a very clear way how Puerto Ricans are treated as not American citizens."