Biden admin admitted chances of cancer affecting East Palestine residents after Norfolk Southern crash was not zero, bombshell emails show
WASHINGTON — The Biden administration admitted possible cancer-causing toxins were spread in East Palestine, Ohio, following the Norfolk Southern train derailment in 2023, explosive new emails show, despite the White House insisting residents were safe.“The occurrence of a cancer-cluster in EP [East Palestine] is not zero,” FEMA recovery leader James McPherson wrote in a March 29, 2024, email to other public health officials — a little more than a year after the crash.“As you all are aware, the first 48 hours of the fire created a really toxic plume,” he said in the chain of communications, which were first reported by News Nation.Just two months earlier, President Biden had excoriated “multimillion-dollar railroad companies transporting toxic chemicals” for the fiasco — but praised his administration’s “herculean efforts” to resolve the “vast majority” of East Palestine’s problems.The crash spewed harmful chemicals into the air and resulted in 115,000 gallons’ worth of carcinogenic vinyl chloride undergoing an open burn — displacing residents and leading to reports of strange illnesses as well as the death of livestock in the weeks following the Feb.3, 2023, disaster.
Michael Regan, the Environmental Protection Agency administrator, showed up on Feb.22 with TV cameras in tow to capture himself drinking from the local water supply, and months later claimed unequivocally that people in East Palestine were “not in danger.”“Since the disaster, EPA has collected more than 100 million air monitoring data points and more than 25 thousand samples in and around the community,” Regan said in an Oct.
17, 2023, statement.“This data collection continues, and ongoing science-based reviews show that residents of East Palestine are not in danger from contaminated drinking water, soil, or air from the derailment.”But a watchdog group that has been investigating the toxic fallout from the train derailment said the Biden administration�...