Politics

J.D. Vance Says Toxic Waste Is Sitting In The Middle Of East Palestine Weeks After Train Derailment

Screenshot, Twitter, Senator Vance Press Office

James Lynch Investigative Reporter
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Republican Ohio Sen. J.D. Vance said Thursday a toxic pile of waste in East Palestine, Ohio, has not been removed by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) weeks after a train derailment unleashed deadly chemicals into the town.

Vance delivered testimony alongside Democratic Ohio Sen. Sherrod Brown and Pennsylvania Democratic Sen. Bob Casey in a hearing about the East Palestine train derailment held by the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works. (RELATED: ‘Party Of Working People’: JD Vance Implores Fellow Republicans To Support Bipartisan Railroad Bill)

“On February 21, the EPA announced that they had taken over the site, and that they were going to be running the cleanup. Unfortunately, this announcement, like so many made by the Biden administration, had only a tenuous relationship to reality,” Vance said.

“The Governor of Michigan, an administration ally and rising democratic star, leapt to prevent the waste from being transported to her state. Other states soon raised their own objections, and for nearly a week a vast hill of poison soil has sat there, basically in the middle of town, kicked up by passing trains for children to breathe, falling to earth to leach into the drinking water,” he added.

“I’m told the waste is being moved once again after it tested negative for dioxins, but that the administrator himself has to sign off on its individual movements. Let’s stop playing politics, and get this stuff to places where it can’t hurt anyone else,” Vance continued.

A Norfolk Southern train carrying toxic chemicals derailed in East Palestine on Feb. 3. The chemicals were unleashed into the town’s environment by a controlled burn carried out to prevent a deadly explosion. Civilians were ordered to evacuate the town as toxic smoke traveled for miles across the border of Ohio and Pennsylvania.

Residents of East Palestine continue to report illnesses caused by the chemicals, despite assurances from state and federal officials about the water and air being clean.