It appears that Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg actually took responsibility for once and admitted his failure in response to the hazardous train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio.
During an interview with Nexstar’s Washington correspondent Reshad Hudson, Buttigieg claimed that he could have acted more promptly in his response to the ecological disaster, which pumped toxic chemicals (including vinyl chloride) into the air, soil, and water earlier this month.
“What’s your message to people who are concerned that the department was late to speak out on this issue?” Hudson asked.
The former South Bend, Indiana mayor replied, “Well, to be clear, our department was on the ground within hours helping with the response and the investigation.”
SIDE EYE….
Lawmakers say Sec. Buttigieg was late to speak out on train derailment in East Palestine.
"I do think that it's important to speak out about that. And I could have spoken out sooner. And I'm making sure that we are focused on the actions that are going to make a difference." pic.twitter.com/pd4pNkMFGi
— Reshad Hudson (@ReshadHudson) February 21, 2023
“Again, I respect the separate role of NTSB, but we have been on the ground literally from day one to make sure that we’re doing our part to support,” he continued.
“I do think that it’s important to speak out about that and I could have spoken out sooner and I’m making sure that we are focused on the actions that are gonna make a difference,” Buttigieg added.
Okay so he tried to soften the blow by claiming they did all they could from the get go, but I am still shocked that he admitted guilt at all.
During a different interview on Tuesday with ABC’s Good Morning America, Buttigieg told host George Stephanopoulos that he has plans to visit East Palestine.
Considering the derailment happened on February 3 and the “controlled release” of chemicals happened on February 10, and it is now February 21, I’d say he is a little late on planning.
“I am planning to go, and our folks were on the ground from the first hours,” Buttigieg said. “I do wanna stress that the NTSB needs to be able to do its work independently, but when I go, the focus is gonna be on action.”
“Look, I was mayor of my hometown for eight years. We dealt with a lot of disasters, natural and human,” he continued. .
“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 kinds of things don’t happen in the future,” Buttigieg added.
Yeah, we’ll see about that.
