President Joe Biden and his White House took a well-deserved uppercut in the optics department over the past several weeks by seemingly avoiding the East Palestine, Ohio toxic train derailment site altogether.
According to The Daily Wire, making matters even worse for the already struggling, elderly president and his administration is what Biden said when he finally responded to reporters' questions about why he decided not to visit the crash site and reassure local residents that everything will be alright.
ABC News host David Muir finally got the president to address his bizarre absence from the crash site. That's when Biden made a bad situation even worse -- and excruciatingly embarrassing -- by not being able to recall whether or not he had spoken to East Palestine's mayor.
Muir asked, "So do you plan to travel there and have you talked with the mayor?"
That's when Biden, who many believe is in a state of severe cognitive decline, became a little fuzzy on the details of his involvement, if you can call it that, in East Palestine.
“I can’t recall whether, I don’t think I’ve talked to the mayor. I’ve talked to everyone else there,” Biden claimed.
He added: “Multiple times, talked to both the senators, both, both governors, I’ve talked to everyone that there is to talk to and we made it clear that everything is available.”
Joe Biden is asked if he talked to the Mayor of East Palestine.
His answer: “I can't recall... I've talked to everyone there is to talk to”
— Benny Johnson (@bennyjohnson) February 24, 2023
The president was also hit with another rare, hard question from a usually friendly outlet. Muir asked him if he heard that the East Palestine mayor criticized him for going to Ukraine while the tragic derailment incident was unfolding and making national news.
“Let’s put this in perspective. Within two hours of that derailment, the EPA was in there, within two hours,” Biden said.
The president added: “Every major agency in the United States government that’s had anything to do with rail and/or cleanup was there and is there."
Clearly, Biden couldn't answer the question as it was asked, because even he has to know how embarrassing it is that he would travel to Ukraine before attending to the needs of blue-collar Americans first.
Biden could have been on the ground in East Palestine for 20 minutes, said some words of reassurance, and been on his way. And that's all it would have taken to avoid a humiliating news cycle of negative coverage over his lackluster response.
All that the residents of East Palestine wanted to see is that our leader would show up in a time of need. Biden failed to show up, just like he fails on every other issue he faces.
