The president also said he hopes the Flint water crisis helps launch a national conversation on infrastructure investment, which he said has been hurt by small government crusaders. “I want to come here today to apologise”, he said.
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In 2014, Flint switched sources from the same supply that sends water to Detroit to the Flint River.
Obama did, however, meet with 8-year-old Amariyanna “Mari” Copeny, who has pressed lawmakers to scale up their response to her city’s water problems.
Three Michigan state and local officials were criminally charged in April in an investigation into lead levels in Flint’s water, and the state attorney general said there would be more charges.
Snyder, taking the stage at the high school, apologized for a second time and tried to empathize with the crowd. I know you’re scared.
“It’s right to be angry”, he said, “but you can’t be passive”. He seemed to amend Snyder’s admission that government had failed the people of Flint, instead stating that the conservative ideology that government should do as little as possible was to blame, The Detroit News reports. Obama’s visit was largely meant to assuage those fears. “I really did need a glass of water”, he insisted. He asked again before he was handed a small glass.
Mr Obama declared a state of emergency for the city in January and ordered federal aid for the crisis.
President Obama says it is not overreaching to expect the government to make sure residents’ drinking water is safe.
“It’s about what we have seen take place here in Flint but also in some other places”.
But he also suggested that some lead exposure in children wouldn’t necessarily lead to dire consequences. In 2011, one year after his election, the state took over Flint and appointed four emergency managers with the power to make budgetary decisions.
“It’s an ideology that undervalues the common good”, Obama said.
Valerie Jarrett, a senior adviser to Obama, tweeted a picture of the president embracing the girl during his Flint visit.
Obama hasn’t weighed in explicitly on Snyder’s handling of the crisis, though Democratic 2016 hopefuls Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders have called on him to resign.
Moore has long voiced concerns about the Flint water crisis.
“This was a man-made disaster”.
“No, no, no”, Obama said. And while he said he didn’t want to go over every “screw-up that resulted in contaminated water”, he blamed an overarching attitude that less government is better. “It leads to systemic neglect and carelessness and callousness”.
Air Force One landed at Bishop International Airport and Gov. Rick Snyder was among the officials waiting on the tarmac to greet the president. He made the remark during a visit to the city yesterday.
Much of the crowd, however, was appreciative, giving Obama a standing ovation multiple times throughout the speech.
“It’s not going to happen overnight, but we have to get started”, Obama told hundreds of people gathered in a high school gymnasium. Debbie Stabenow and Flint Mayor Karen Weaver.
Obama also acknowledged that the use of filters does not negate the fact that numerous pipes in the city need to be either repaired or replaced, but he also added that it will be a long process.
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In his conversation earlier in the day, the president said it was expressed to him that parents are anxious their kids would be shackled with a health disadvantage for the rest of their lives. “And he has them now”.
