Better late than never!
President Joe Biden on Friday directed federal agencies to go door-to-door in East Palestine, Ohio, starting Saturday, to check on families affected by the toxic train derailment.
Under Biden’s order, teams from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Environmental Protection Agency and Federal Emergency Management Agency will visit homes.
Workers will ask how residents are doing, see what they need and connect them with appropriate resources from government and nonprofit organizations, the White House said.
The 'walk teams' are modeled on similar teams following hurricanes and other natural disasters.
Biden directed employees to get to as many homes as possible by Monday. Officials said the immediate goal was to visit at least 400. The president said he currently has no plans to personally visit Ohio.
Biden on Friday rejected the notion that his administration hasn’t been present in providing assistance in a bizarre exchange as he left the White House to spend the weekend at his Delaware home.
'We were there two hours after the train went down. Two hours,' Biden said at the White House. 'I’ve spoken with every single major figure in both Pennsylvania and in Ohio. And so the idea that we’re not engaged is simply not there.'
But Democrats - including blundering Transport Secretary Pete Buttigieg - have been accused of initially playing the disaster down. They were embarrassed into taking it more seriously after a well-publicized visit to the site by former President Donald Trump earlier this week.
During Friday's interaction, Biden struggled to remember the word Zoom telling reporters: ' Did a whole video, I mean, um, what the hell, on,' Biden rambled as he looked for reporters to fill in the gap. 'Zoom?' one of the reporters said, trying to help the president.
'Zoom! All I can think of every time I think of Zoom is that song in my generation, Who's Zoomin' Who,' he said, referencing the Aretha Franklin song.
A timeline given out by the White House Friday said DOT provided 'initial incident notification' to members of the Ohio congressional delegation and relevant committees on Saturday, Feb. 4, less than a day after the derailment.
That same day, EPA deployed real-time air monitoring instruments in 12 locations surrounding the wreck site and in the neighboring community, the White House said.