According to a new survey conducted for Newsweek, the majority of Americans believed that President Joe Biden should have visited East Palestine, the Ohio town following the derailment of a train with close to 150 cars on February 3rd. The train derailment led to a toxic chemical spill in the area.
In order to mitigate the dangers, rescue workers used controlled burns in five of the cars in order to burn the vinyl chloride, a potentially explosive gas, which releases toxic gasses hydrogen chloride and phosgene.
Biden has not visited the area since the disaster, while Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg only made a trip to East Palestine 20 days after the accident.
One day before Buttigieg made his trip to East Palestine, former President Donald Trump, who has placed a bid for the White House in 2024, visited the area carrying crates of Trump water for the residents of the area.
According to the survey which was conducted by Redfield & Wilton Strategies, it included 1,500 eligible U.S. voters, 66 percent of Americans believed that Biden should have visited the site, while only 16 percent said that he should not. Eighteen percent of those asked were not sure about whether or not they should visit the area.
On February 20, Biden chose to make a surprise visit to Kyiv, the capital of Ukraine only days before the first anniversary of the Russian invasion. This trip led to a lot of criticism from East Palestine mayor Trent Conaway who called it “the biggest slap in the face” during an appearance on Fox News.
