On February 3, a 141-car Norfolk Southern train derailed in the eastern Ohio town of East Palestine. About 50 of the rail cars were damaged, including five tank cars carrying toxic and carcinogenic vinyl chloride. Safety crews vented and burned the vinyl chloride. The town was ordered evacuated, ‘Leave Now’: Hundreds of Residents Near Site of East Palestine, Ohio Train Derailment Ordered to Evacuate.
To call the official response tepid would give it too much credit.
The Biden White House has essentially ignored the issue. Our alleged Transportation Secretary, the poster child for Equity in this regime, was more concerned about too many white guys getting hired on construction projects (Pete Buttigieg Is too Busy Blaming White Men for Things to Be Bothered With the East Palestine Disaster) to pay any attention. I guess the men there weren’t on maternity leave or enjoying the pleasures of gay parenthood, so they don’t count. When he finally did comment, it was to lie in an attempt to place the blame for the accident on the Trump Administration (Debunking the Claim That Donald Trump Is to Blame for the Ohio Train Disaster).
Ohio Governor Mike DeWine had been flying top cover for Biden’s inactivity.
DeWine is nearly as pathetic as Chris Christie kissing Obama’s butt in the aftermath of Hurricane Sandy. If he thought his pandering would do him or the people of East Palestine any good, that thought was soon put to rest. On Thursday morning, 13 days after the train derailment, with the toxic plume from the burn-off of the vinyl chloride covering at least 225 miles downwind, DeWine asked for federal aid. Instead, he was told to FOAD because this was not a “traditional disaster.”
The DeWine Administration has been in daily contact with FEMA to discuss the need for federal support, however FEMA continues to tell Governor DeWine that Ohio is not eligible for assistance at this time
I can’t find any evidence that DeWine has visited East Palestine, which, if true, speaks volumes.
Senator JD Vance has visited (JD Vance Makes Horrible Discovery in East Palestine Creek; J.D Vance and East Palestine Mayor Sum up Failed Response of Biden Admin).
Finally, someone from the Biden regime has shown up, EPA Administrator Michael Regan. With him, he brought advice.
The video below is cued to that clip.
I can’t figure out if this guy is cruelly referencing Ronald Reagan’s “I’m from the government, and I’m here to help,” if he was making a play on “three biggest lies (your check is in the mail, etc.), or if he actually believed what he was saying. I don’t even know which would be worse.
What we’re seeing from the federal government, in this case appears to me to rise above and beyond the call of mediocrity and indifference that we expect and has slid head-on into maliciousness.
East Palestine is located in Columbiana County, OH. The voters in that county preferred President Trump to Joey SoftServ by 45 points in the 2020 [s]election. According to the Census Bureau, the median age is 40. Nearly half the households have someone over 60 living there. Fifteen percent of the 1208 families are people over 65, living alone. There are 33 Blacks in the town of 4,548. Only 9% of the town has a college degree. The median income is $26,000, compared to Ohio’s average of nearly $62,000.
Those data points explain 100% of the actions taken so far. To the Biden White House, these people are MAGA extremists who should just die anyway. To the bureaucrats everywhere, they are a down-at-the-heels, blue-collar, and overwhelmingly White town that just doesn’t matter and isn’t worth the effort of helping.
No, the government is not there to help. No, they don’t care about you. And no, you can’t trust them.