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HBO late night host Bill Maher hammered the Biden administration for its “slow” response to the toxic train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio, last week and lambasted Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg for waiting 10 days to comment on the disaster.
Maher noted Friday on his show “Real Time” that there would likely be a substantial difference in coverage of the incident by mainstream media and alternative news outlets — such as Infowars, for example.
“I feel it’s going to be interesting to see how the two different media silos — shall we say — are going to cover the derailment and the environmental disaster in East Palestine, Ohio. Because I feel like the Biden administration has been slow in picking up on this,” Maher said.
“And I’m not sure if they’ve been giving the people the most accurate information if the chickens are dying and [they’re saying,] that’s really nothing.”
As Infowars reported last week, animals and livestock around the East Palestine area have been getting sick and even dying in the days following the Norfolk Southern train derailment that resulted in the controlled burn of toxic chemicals.
The mainstream media, meanwhile, barely covered the fallout initially but intense public interest of the issue forced them to cover more of the developing story.
Maher went on to lambast Buttigieg for refusing to comment on the matter until 10 days after the derailment despite the issue being very much in his wheelhouse.
“Mayor Pete, I like Mayor Pete a lot. I think he’s a brilliant guy. He’s a big darling of the left. He didn’t comment on it publicly for ten days, it’s part of his portfolio, it is a train. It’s the EPA also,” Maher remarked.
Notably, when Buttigieg finally did comment on the toxic train derailment, he downplayed the accident by claiming that over 1,000 train derailments occur in the U.S. every year, neglecting to mention that those accidents rarely involved hazardous materials leaking out.
Buttigieg: "While this horrible situation has gotten a particularly high amount of attention, there are roughly 1,000 cases a year of a train derailing."
pic.twitter.com/q51ytsBb4f— Greg Price (@greg_price11) February 16, 2023
The Biden administration on Friday denied federal assistance for East Palestine, but reversed its decision after former President Donald Trump announced he would soon visit the area amid cleanup efforts.