CLAY: We’ve been talking about East Palestine. We are joined now by State Senator Mike Rulli, 33rd District representative in Ohio. And I appreciate you calling in the show and reaching out. We talked with Congressman Bill Johnson, who represents this area in D.C. State Senator Mike Rulli, what would you say are things like on the ground right now and does it feel safe and in any way contained?
SEN. RULLI: Good afternoon, Clay. I’ve been there. Yesterday was my sixth time there. I was there yesterday with the delegation of the speaker of the House of Ohio and about 17 reps. I see things a little different than the narrative og the state and the local and the federal. I don’t think everything is safe. I’ve been there six times. The one day I was there about 10 hours. Yesterday I was there about 5-1/2 hours. So, every time I go there, my nose gets messed up. I get a little sore throat in the back of my throat. And yesterday in particular, I stopped and got a coffee right outside of East Palestine — right in between Columbiana and there — and I drank the coffee. It was a large with cream, and right now my tongue and my lips are still tingling, almost like with covid.
So, you know, I don’t understand how the opposition party says I’m the party of environmentalism when this is the biggest environmental, environmentalist — I don’t know — crisis in the last 50 years and the president chooses to go to Kiev and Buttigieg refuses to show up and they want you to go back to normal. And now all the delegation is saying drink the water. I’m urging everyone, do not drink the water, and I’m urging everyone to get more soil samples, more air samples, more water samples. If you have a well, you should be tested twice a month. And also, Norfolk and the government have only a one-mile perimeter. That perimeter needs to be expanded anywhere between 10 to 20 miles out. We should probably do light monitoring 100 miles out. Now, I just don’t understand how there’s no urgency with this.
CLAY: What will Trump coming to the community on Wednesday, in your mind, do? What will he help to facilitate? What will the impact be?
SEN. RULLI: Well, I think you know, probably better than I do, Clay, that it’s just ironic that the president says he’s going to come comment all of a sudden, FEMA is interested in helping and they want they’re going to get FEMA dollars. I know Governor DeWine for a fact, has asked FEMA or several times, and they came up with this malarkey that we don’t fit the parameters of what qualifies for a FEMA disaster, whether it’s, you know, a tornado or a hurricane or whatever. They say this doesn’t qualify. So, I guess Love Canal doesn’t qualify or Flint, Michigan, doesn’t qualify or Three Mile Island doesn’t qualify. It’s really scary.
CLAY: What do your constituents think when they see Joe Biden traveling all the way over the Atlantic Ocean to go pay attention and give his presidential seal of support to Ukrainians, but he won’t get in an airplane and fly an hour or so from D.C. to check on people in East Palestine.
SEN. RULLI: Well, you know, I represent Youngstown, Ohio, and, you know, all of Mahoning, Columbiana, and Carroll County, and it’s blue collar. You know, I’m the only Republican to ever be elected because everybody has lied to the blue-collar flyover country. So, I feel this administration almost has a war on blue-collar America and we’re the forgotten people. And it doesn’t really matter what happens to us because we’re not that important. You know, if we’re not on either coast, just forget about flyover country. And this is real stuff.
I’m right now trying to figure out, we have close to 2100 homes in East Palestine, and in order for me to get a hazmat crew in there, clean the vinyl and clean the decks, clean the inside rugs — you know, make it whole, go through the HVACs, get all that poison out of there — you’re looking at over $100 million, and nobody wants to talk about that. I have farmers. If you go within ten miles outside of Ground Zero, I have 143 farmers that are calling me right now, Clay, and they want to know if they can put their seed in the ground. They’re going to lose everything! Where’s the $100 million I need for that? But yet we’re going to give, you know, hundreds of billions of dollars to Ukraine? I mean, how about the American people!
CLAY: No doubt. Well, we appreciate the work that you are doing on the ground there, helping to keep everybody focused on what has happened in East Palestine. Appreciate you calling in and let us know if we can help out any more here.
SEN. RULLI: You’re the best, my friend. Have a great day.
CLAY: Thank you so much.
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