After a cargo ship collided with a bridge in Baltimore, destroying its structure, right-wing pundits and politicians quickly sought to blame the incident on unrelated political issues.
On Fox News, Maria Bartiromo tied it to border security and immigration, questioning if “foul play” was involved given the “wide open border.”
“Maersk is out with comments this morning, the container vessel that collided with the bridge was chartered by Maersk,” Bartiromo said. “You’re on Homeland Security. I want to understand the threats or the potential threats that this country is facing right now given the wide open border, the fact that we don’t know who is in the country. We heard from officials that the FBI is looking into that but this is customary. FBI is always going to look into a situation like this to ensure there was no foul play.”
Matt Schlapp on Newsmax admits he's "no expert" but tries to blame the Baltimore bridge collapse on "drug-addled" employees and covid lockdowns pic.twitter.com/TAxjgRU5Dt
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) March 26, 2024
“Let me get your take on what’s going on in terms of world affairs. The White House issued a statement on this saying there’s no indication of a nefarious intent in the collapse of the Francis Scott Key Bridge. The ship involved in the collapse of the bridge is 948 feet long and called The Dali, a Singaporean-flagged container,” Bartiromo said.
“Of course, you’ve been talking a lot about wrongdoing or the potential for foul play, given the wide-open border. That is why you have been so adamant. Why have the Republicans had such a hard time securing the border? The president says he’s not going to take executive action. You know that!”
A guest on Newsmax implied COVID lockdowns and diversity hiring led to “drug-addled” workers and infrastructure issues.
“You look at our critical infrastructure and I’m one of these people that believes we’ve never fully come out of all the lockdowns and the COVID issues and you can look…at our air traffic controllers where we have critical mission problems with filling slots,” American Conservation Union president Matt Schlapp said.
“All I would say is that if you talk to employers in America, they’ll tell you that filling slots with employees who aren’t drug-addled is a very huge problem, so I’m making no specific charges here because we don’t know,” he said. “But you know anybody who flies in America can see that you’re constantly waiting on a tarmac somewhere for some crew to show up. There’s more maintenance problems than we’ve ever had, which I think are euphemisms for the problems that I’ve described.”
Another Newsmax guest and a Republican congresswoman criticized the Biden administration’s infrastructure bill, claiming not enough funding went to bridges.
However, authorities said early indications were that it was an accident after the ship lost power, and the causes were under investigation.
“Look at the $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill that was done a couple of years ago that the left hails as this massive success, but it was mostly ‘Green New Deal,’” Rep. Nancy Mace said. “Actually in that bill, $110 billion went to surface transportation, which is roads and bridges. And of that $110 billion, $70 billion went to public transportation, leaving only $40 billion for traditional roads and bridges, what you and I think about. And if you live along the coast or you live near water, you know that our bridges are rusting out, you know that we have many, many bridges that have to be replaced and upgraded.”
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