But he also urged caution: “Right now, the residents of that community want the workers to get that place cleaned up.
Bill Johnson, who represents the area, called on President Joe Biden to visit the community and said he would hold a field hearing of the House Subcommittee on Environment, Manufacturing and Critical Minerals in East Palestine. A parade of political figures, social media influencers and TV producers have descended on the village of 5,000 residents in recent weeks.
And this week, he followed with bipartisan legislative action to call on federal agencies to make long-term medical testing available to residents as well as proposing new federal safety regulations and financial consequences for train operators.Īs the images of black, billowing smoke from the wreck and concerns of local residents morphed from a man-made disaster into a political battleground, there is a growing sense among lawmakers that locals don’t appreciate being used as pawns. I’ll work with anyone to do that and to get these reforms passed.”īrown has also made a pair of visits to East Palestine to meet with emergency workers and local residents. “My job is always to fight for the dignity of work, to fight for these workers, to fight for these communities, to make sure this never happens again. “It’s the kind of community that’s too often forgotten about or exploited by corporate America,” he told reporters this week. Brown has laid the blame for the disaster squarely on the corporation that operated the train that derailed, Norfolk Southern, and positioned himself as a fighter for places like East Palestine. In the early stages of what will be a fierce fight for control of Congress next year, the response to the train derailment in Ohio is emerging as an early barometer of whether Democrats can rebuild support in working-class communities.
Brown is under heightened pressure to prove them wrong. Republicans, including former President Donald Trump, argue the federal response shows Democrats have left such regions behind. Sherrod Brown has survived a decade of statewide Democratic losses in Ohio by building a reputation as the rare person in his party who can still connect with the white working-class voters who have increasingly shifted to Republicans.īut as he heads into what could be a tough reelection campaign, Brown is facing a critical test in the aftermath of a train derailment in an eastern Ohio village.
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