The head of the Environmental Protection Agency claims her agency was basically powerless to deal with the Flint, Mich., lead water crisis due to the state’s failures, prompting the House oversight chairman to say, “You just don’t get it.”

EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy said Thursday that on July 21, 2015, the EPA told the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality that they needed to get a handle on the lead water situation in the city of 100,000 people.