(Headline USA) President Joe Biden is finally set to visit East Palestine, Ohio nearly one year after a disastrous train derailment forced hundreds of residents to abandon their homes.
Though some Biden administration officials, including Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, reluctantly visited the community in the aftermath of the train derailment, Biden declined to travel to the area himself.
When asked earlier this month if the president ever planned to meet with residents in East Palestine, White House press secretary Karine Jean–Pierre said, “The president will visit when it’s most helpful to the community.”
Apparently, that time is the one-year anniversary of the disaster, which happened on Feb. 3, 2023.
Biden planned to use the visit to highlight his administration’s “comprehensive, whole-of-government response” to ensure railroad safety, according to the White House.
East Palestine Mayor Trent Conaway, who blasted Biden repeatedly for his administration’s response to the train derailment, suggested the Democrat leader would be better off not coming at all.
Conaway told Fox News, Biden could visit in “February of 2025, when he is on his book tour,” seeming to imply that he would not be re-elected in November.
HEAR IT – THINGS ARE REALLY BAD: East Palestine Mayor Trent Conaway says he did not need to invite Donald Trump to come visit after the disaster, but he had to put out a personal invitation for Joe Biden to visit after a year. WATCH pic.twitter.com/ronIkxIspM
— Simon Ateba (@simonateba) February 1, 2024
Conaway added that the president was “always welcome to our town.” But “that being said, I don’t know what he would do here now.”
Several East Palestine residents have also publicly blasted the president for his apathy concerning the struggles they’ve endured as a result of the toxic chemicals spilled during the train derailment.
“I still have yet to take my kids into East Palestine—I’m still fearful of what it’s going to cause,” said local resident Courtney Miller, who has been staying in a motel outside of the area ever since the derailment.
“I just don’t feel comfortable,” Miller added. “And I don’t want to take my kids into something that, obviously, Biden doesn’t even want to show up [at].”
In stark contrast to Biden, former President Donald Trump met with residents of East Palestine just weeks after the incident with Sen. J.D. Vance, R-Ohio.
“You are not forgotten,” Trump told residents at the time. “We stand with you. We pray for you. And we will stand with you and your fight to help ensure the accountability that you deserve.”
The Biden administration’s cavalier attitude toward East Palestine stands in stark contrast with its disproportionate interest in the Middle Eastern territory of Palestine, to which he has already delivered at least $100 million in humanitarian aid, while pushing Congress to approve even more as longtime U.S. ally Israel seeks to eradicate the Hamas terrorist network responsible for an Oct. 7, 2023, ambush that left an estimated 1,200 dead and took more than 200 hostages.
