Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg will visit East Palestine, OH, on Thursday, according to Politico, which cited “a person familiar with his plans.”
A train derailed in East Palestine on February 3rd, spilling four dangerous and toxic chemicals.
It took ten days for Buttigieg to acknowledge the disaster. During that time, Buttigieg complained about too many white people working in construction. He also condemned the shooting at Michigan State University.
Now it’s taking Buttigieg 20 days to visit the site. The National Transportation Safety Board will provide Buttigieg with updates “on its probe, which could take as long as 18 months to complete.” He’ll talk with other Department of Transportation officials.
Politico mentioned it’s rare for the transportation secretary to visit a train derailment site without any fatalities.
But this train derailment makes sense because of the national attention and because it might be one of the worst environmental disasters in America:
“The secretary is going now that the EPA has said it is moving out of the emergency response phase and transitioning to the long-term remediation phase,” the person familiar with Buttigieg’s thinking told POLITICO.
Buttigieg said he would visit the site “when the time is right.”
At least EPA Administrator Michael Regan has visited East Palestine twice. He consumed a glass of tap water to show the residents that the water was safe to drink.
East Palestine Mayor Trent Conaway described President Joe Biden’s visit to Ukraine as “the biggest slap in the face.” He said it’s proof “he doesn’t care about us.”
Conaway fumed: “He can send every agency he wants to, but I found out this morning that he was in Ukraine giving millions of dollars away to people over there and not to us … on Presidents Day in our country, so I’m furious.”
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