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A senior Trump team official revealed the moment that “really set the campaign on a path to victory” — the day President-elect Donald Trump arrived in Columbiana County, Ohio, to study the derailment of the east palestine train.
“The ripples that day don’t get enough attention,” White House communications director-designate Steven Cheung told X, before Twitter, retweeting an op-ed making that claim.
In February 2023, a Norfolk-Southern train carrying caustic industrial chemicals, including vinyl chloride, derailed in a small community near the Pennsylvania border, causing immediate chaos and widespread and lasting damage to the region.
A controlled burn that took place shortly after the derailment released toxic phosgene into the air.
COMPLAINT ALLEGES ERRORS IN INITIAL RESPONSE TO EAST PALESTINE CASTRAS
Steven Cheung (inset) and Donald Trump. (Getty)
On February 23 – Ash Wednesday – Sen. JD Vance, R-Ohio, hosted Trump at the venue, where the former and future president singled out Americans “forgotten” by President Joe Biden, who has yet to be they had filed and would not visit each other for several years. more months
The Republican mogul handed out “Trump”-branded water and met with local officials. Meanwhile, officials in both Ohio and Pennsylvania were also visibly working to hold the railroad accountable.
In his tweet, Cheung was responding to a edition of the Pittsburgh-based Washington Examiner writer Selina Zito, who covered the crisis at the time.
Zito wrote that Trump’s arrival had come at a political high point for the Republican, after losses in the 2022 midterms and in the midst of a close presidential primary race with Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis.
He noted in a tweet that it was Vance, his future running mate, who drove him to the site.
Trump’s “don’t forget” mantra to Rust Belt residents too often forgotten by Washington helped change minds in the area, Zito wrote, citing one local resident who said he had “switched parties for the the way he spoke directly about concerns.”
“I’ve voted for him both times since then,” said the woman, who owns a farm in East Palestine.
TRUMP VISITS EASTERN PALESTINE, DELIVERS WATER TRUMP: “WE ARE WITH YOU”
Former President Donald Trump, with Sen. JD Vance, R-Ohio, leaves after greeting supporters and touring water pumps in Little Beaver Creek during a visit to East Palestine, Ohio. (Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post via Getty)
Trump told residents that day that “in too many cases, your kindness and perseverance were met with indifference and betrayal.”
The disparity between Trump’s eagerness to “show up” and Biden’s apparent delay in a visit to East Palestine helped tip the tide in the Republican’s favor, the column continued.
“100%,” Cheung wrote in his tweet.
Trump’s former running mate, Mike Pence, also called Biden at the time, he said he was “AWOL” and told Fox News that the Delaware Democrat’s policies had “derailed the economy of eastern Palestine long before the train arrived.”
Next to Pennsylvania of the line, both Democratic Gov. Josh Shapiro and his then-former gubernatorial opponent, state Sen. Doug Mastriano, R-Gettysburg, also quickly responded to the derailment.
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Shapiro filed a criminal referral at the time, and Mastriano led hearings that hosted affected residents along the Ohio border, where Norfolk-Southern CEO Alan Shaw was a notable no-show.
“It is very disheartening to hear that these alleged delays and flawed response approaches took place, especially since those in East Palestine, Ohio and areas of my district here in Pennsylvania have been dealing with the consequences of this derailment for over ‘a year,” said state Sen. Elder Vogel Jr. on Fox News Digital at the time, after a whistleblower had spoken out about alleged mistakes in Biden’s EPA response, which the agency had made. disputed
