(C) Florida Phoenix This story was originally published by Florida Phoenix and is unaltered. . . . . . . . . . . Marco Rubio wants Pete Buttigieg to resign over response to Ohio train disaster [1] ['Mitch Perry', 'More From Author', '- February'] Date: 2023-02-16 Florida U.S. Senator Marco Rubio is calling on President Joe Biden to request the “immediate resignation” of Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, saying that he has “downplayed crisis after crisis while prioritizing topics of little relevance to our nation’s transportation system.” Most immediately, Rubio cited Buttigieg’s response to the Feb. 3 derailment of a train carrying toxic chemicals which subsequently caught fire in East Palestine, Ohio. Two days after the incident, residents near the site were ordered to evacuate following the controlled release of a toxic chemical to prevent an explosion, CNN has reported. Officials now say the area is safe but have urged people to drink bottled water as a precaution. Buttigieg has not appeared in the area since the incident occurred. He said on Tuesday that his department was “constrained by law on some areas of rail regulation,” referring to a braking rule that the Trump administration withdrew in 2018. Other federal agencies including the National Transportation Safety Board are investigating, while Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Michael Regan was on the ground in East Palestine on Thursday, vowing that the Biden administration would “get to the bottom” of the incident, NBC News is reporting. Rubio and Ohio Republican Sen. J.D. Vance wrote to Buttigieg on Wednesday, requesting information about how the Department of Transportation oversees the nation’s freight system. In his letter calling for Biden to fire Buttigieg, Rubio said that, while the transportation secretary has acknowledged the situation in East Palestine, “he continues to deflect any accountability for the safety of our nation’s rail system,” adding, “This is part of a two-year long pattern.” Buttigieg and the Department of Transportation have been under fire in recent months, such as when a Federal Aviation Authority computer meltdown forced a nearly two-hour nationwide shutdown of domestic air travel a few weeks following widespread flight cancellations by Southwest Airlines. Republicans have also criticized Buttigieg for flying too frequently on private airplanes. A bill filed last month by South Carolina Republican Congresswoman Nancy Mace would require Buttigieg and his team to fly commercial only. Mace alleged in a press release that Buttigieg had flown private approximately 20 times in the last six months of 2022. “For two years, the transparency and accountability that you promised to obsessively uphold during your inauguration has been nowhere to be found,” Rubio writes in his letter to President Biden. “The incompetence and failure within your administration cannot continue to be ignored when Americans health and safety are at risk.” [END] --- [1] Url: https://floridaphoenix.com/2023/02/16/marco-rubio-wants-pete-buttigieg-to-resign-over-response-to-ohio-train-disaster/ Published and (C) by Florida Phoenix Content appears here under this condition or license: Creative Commons CC BY-NC-ND 4.0. via Magical.Fish Gopher News Feeds: gopher://magical.fish/1/feeds/news/floridaphoenix/