Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s emphasis on the lead water crisis in Flint, Mich., shows that she’s presidential material, her husband claims in a new ad.
Released Monday morning, former President Bill Clinton is shown speaking to a crowd about his wife’s work in the eastern Michigan city. Clinton brought a new focus to the lead water crisis when she mentioned it during her closing statements in a Democratic presidential primary debate in January.
Since then, she has sent top campaign aides to Flint to meet with Flint Mayor Karen Weaver, who has endorsed Hillary Clinton, and worked to bring a Democratic presidential primary debate to Flint. Chelsea Clinton has also visited Flint for a rally.
“Her immediate instinct is, ‘What can I do to make it better?'” Bill Clinton says in the ad.
The former president contrasts this attitude with his wife’s rival for the Democratic nomination, Sen. Bernie Sanders. Sanders released a statement on the Flint water crisis in January as well, calling for Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder to resign, but has not made the crisis as central a part of his campaign as Clinton has.
“Her major opponent was just as outraged, his heart was in the right place,” Bill Clinton says. “He wanted to do the right thing and his response was he thought the governor should quit. And, you know, maybe he should, and maybe some day in the future he will. But, in the meanwhile, ‘What can I do?'”
In April 2014, Flint switched its water source from the Detroit Water and Sewerage Department, which draws water from Lake Huron, to a local agency that also would take water from the lake.
However, the infrastructure needed to get water from Lake Huron to Flint under the new agency was not yet built, so an emergency manager appointed by Gov. Rick Snyder decided to take water from the Flint River as a temporary measure.
But the water from the Flint River is so polluted and acidic that the water ate away at the lead pipes bringing water to the city’s homes.
The state did not require Flint to put any corrosion-control chemicals into the water. Those chemicals could have prevented the leaching of lead into the drinking water. The water is now being treated with those chemicals, but the corrosion controls need to once again build back up on the city’s pipes.
The Justice Department is investigating, as is the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
