Another Day, Rather than getting ahead of either
story, the White House has treated these alarming incidents as if they are distractions from the administration’s more important work. The administration’s muddled
response to the East Palestine train wreck was even more mystifying. One of Biden’s fi rst acts in offi ce was sign- ing Executive Order 14008, which mandated putting “environmental justice” at the heart of the administra- tion’s policy eff orts. The order promised to address the
needs of “disadvantaged communities that have been historically marginal- ized and overburdened by pollution and under-investment.” One might think a plume of toxic
smoke towering over a rundown com- munity would be the perfect backdrop for administration offi cials to reinforce this commitment. But East Palestine is in the heart
of Trump country, and its residents, while earning incomes far below the national average, don’t fi t into any of the racial categories the left regards as “marginalized.” So, whether for those or other rea-
sons, the White House paid little atten- tion to the story, even as conservative media seized on it. Managing public perceptions dur-
ing a crisis is a delicate business. Offi cials who are slow to address a
problem, less than fully transparent, or appear to place political calculations fi rst will quickly lose public trust. The Biden administration has made
all three of those mistakes in grappling with the Ohio train wreck and China’s spy balloon. While in the long run these crises
might be remembered as minor, they mark another decline in our confi dence that American government offi cials are leveling with us. Such public trust, once squandered,
is hard to regain.
James B. Meigs is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute and a contributing editor for City Journal.
Another Disaster Pete Buttigieg drops the ball again.
T BY MARISA HERMAN
he biden ad- ministration’s bungled resp- onse to the
toxic train wreck in East Palestine, Ohio, may have fi nally put the brakes on the White House ambitions of Transportation Secre- tary Pete Buttigieg, 41. Ten days passed
from the Feb. 3 derail- ment of the 150-car train, which was carry- ing vinyl chloride, a car- cinogen that can poison water supplies, until Buttigieg fi nally publicly acknowledged the inci- dent . . . by tweet. Buttigieg’s response
is just the most recent crisis he is accused of mishandling. His reputation had
barely recovered from the Christmas travel- ing chaos, when thou- sands of airline fl ights were canceled, leaving passengers stranded for days after winter storms plunged Southwest Air- lines into an operational meltdown. All this despite his confident prediction that last summer’s fl ight disruptions caused by staff shortages at the air- lines “would get better by the holidays.” “Everything about
Buttigieg fl unks crisis communication 101,” said David Johnson, an Atlanta-based com- munications and public
relations expert. “He’s always AWOL.” Former New York
City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, who was invit- ed to East Palestine because of his experi- ence in crisis manage- ment running the Big Apple after the 9/11 attacks, told Newsmax that Buttigieg should have lost his job by now. “If he worked for
me as a commissioner of transportation and he was absent for two weeks, he’d be look- ing for a new job now because he’s obviously not up to this one.” Buttigieg, previous-
ly the mayor of South Bend, Indiana, was on paternity leave from the Transportation Depart- ment when supply chain disruptions hit their peak in 2021. Upon his return, he responded to criticism about his absence by citing a lack of access to aff ordable childcare. When gas prices
surged in 2021, he sug- gested Americans pur- chase expensive elec- tric cars. When a nationwide
rail freight strike loomed last year, Buttigieg was on a personal trip to Por- tugal. Despite the repeat-
ed failures, the White House doesn’t seem to be concerned with But- tigieg’s fl ubs. White House press
secretary Karine Jean- Pierre told reporters: “We do have absolute confi dence” in Buttigieg. Even though But-
tigieg has botched sev- eral assignments, he has largely been given a pass by the press and the Biden White House. Johnson said But-
tigieg receives preferen- tial treatment because he is a “media darling” who is considered a “future presidential can- didate.” Before he ran for
president in 2020, But- tigieg’s only political experience was his two terms as mayor of South Bend, a city of 103,000. Elected in 2012 at age
29, critics slammed him for failing to improve race relations and pub- lic safety and doing lit- tle to fi x a chronic pot- hole problem.
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