Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg thinks being mayor of South Bend, IN, makes him a competent federal official to handle the Ohio chemical disaster:
BUTTIGIEG: “Well, I am planning to go, and our folks were on the ground from the first hours. I do want to stress that the NTSB [National Transportation Safety Board] to be able to do its work independently. But when I go, the focus is going to be on action. Look, I was mayor of my hometown for eight years. We dealt with a lot of disasters, natural and human. And one of the things I noticed very quickly is that there’s two kinds of people who show up when you have that kind of disaster experience: people who are there because they have a specific job to do and are there to get something done, and people who are there to look good and have their picture taken. When I go, it will be about action on rail safety, like the actions that we are calling on Congress to help us with, that we’re calling on industry to take, and that we are undertaking ourselves as a department to help make sure that these kind of things don’t happen in the future.”
Whaaaaaat. None of that made sense at all. It sounds like he’s trying to blame someone else. But what else is new?
The train derailed in East Palestine, OH, on February 3, releasing four dangerous and toxic chemicals.
Where is Buttigieg? Nowhere:
“I am very interested in getting to know the residents of East Palestine, hearing from them about how they’ve been impacted and communicating with them about the steps that we’re taking,” Buttigieg said on a Monday call, adding that he had referred to past common practices of transportation secretaries by deferring first to the National Safety Transportation Board after a major disaster like the derailment. “But yes, when the time is right, I do plan to visit East Palestine. I don’t have a date for you right now.”
Pathetic. Absolutely pathetic.
Residents are scared. The EPA and other officials said the water and air are safe but the citizens are skeptical.
The Biden Administration deployed FEMA two weeks after the disaster. EPA Administrator Michael Regan made another trip to Ohio.
Regan and Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine drank a glass of tap water to demonstrate it’s safe to drink.
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