Biden Leaves East Palestine Without Healthcare; Migrants Struggle at the Texas-Mexico Bord

Biden Leaves East Palestine Without Healthcare; Migrants Struggle at the Texas-Mexico Border; Rashida Tlaib Revives Discredited Allegations against Syria’s Assad

By Capitalism, Race & Democracy - February 19, 2024

On February 16th, President Biden visited the East Palestine, Ohio site of the Norfolk Southern railroad wreck that took place a year ago. After the wreck, Norfolk Southern ignited a massive amount of highly dangerous and deadly vinyl chloride to get the railroad going again, without objection from the Environmental Protection Agency or the Department of Transportation. The residents and workers have been left without healthcare in contaminated homes, without assistance to vacate.

Pacifica’s Steve Zeltzer spoke by phone with resident and pipeline worker Chris Albright and others from the East Palestine community.

He also talked to Mike Schade of Toxic Free Future, whose group has issued a statement signed by over 200 organizations calling on Biden to declare East Palestine a mass casualty site so that all residents and workers can receive healthcare for life. The statement also calls for full testing of community members and sanitation workers who are also experiencing contamination.

East Palestine residents were angry when they discovered President Biden refused to act or to offer health care, especially since many have lost their jobs. They are also furious that while they can’t get healthcare, the Biden administration wants $66 billion for more military weapons to Israel, Ukraine and Taiwan.

***

Eddie Canales of the South Texas Human Rights Center discusses the conditions at the Texas border with Belly of the Beast Media, an independent news collective in Houston.

***

Last week Illinois Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib introduced a resolution to pressure the UN Security Council to create an ad hoc international court to prosecute Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad for alleged crimes against humanity. Pacifica’s Ann Garrison spoke with journalist Aaron Maté. His work exposing the chemical weapons fraud can be found on http://www.thegrayzone.com.

***

Russian President Vladimir Putin condemned Tucker Carlson’s anti-China propaganda during their interview in Moscow, and also chided Carlson for applying to join the CIA as a young man. Journalist Ben Norton documents the former Fox News host’s long history of pushing for war on China.

And that concludes today’s edition of Capitalism, Race & Democracy. We thank all of Pacifica’s sister stations and affiliates who contribute to the production of this show. Today’s program was produced by the Capitalism, Race & Democracy collective, with contributions from Vi Patel-Adams, Steve Zeltzer, Ann Garrison, Polina Vasiliev, and hosted by Akua Holt.

You can find this and all previous episodes at our website “capitalism race and democracy dot ORG”. Make sure you click the subscribe button. Follow us on X, formerly Twitter, @PacificaCRD. I’ve been your host, Akua Holt.

Thanks for listening!

Music:

The Pretenders, “My City Was Gone”

Gogol Bordello – Immigraniada (We Comin’ Rougher)


Robert Glasper, So Beautiful