Washington — President Trump is blaming government leaders in the metro Washington, D.C. area, among them Maryland Gov. Wes Moore, following a massive sewage spill into the Potomac River in the Washington, D.C. area, perhaps the largest in American history.
President Trump said in a post on Truth Social Tuesday that the federal government would help clean up the spill, which occurred in mid-January, if local leaders ask “politely,” though he had said Monday in a so he would direct federal authorities to “immediately provide all necessary management, direction and coordination” to protect the Potomac.
After Moore indicated the federal government bears the responsibility for maintaining the collapsed 60-year-old Potomac Interceptor behind the spill, Mr. Trump said in his post that Maryland, Virginia and Washington, D.C. were responsible for the “massive sewage spill,” and if they can’t fix it, “they have to call me and ask, politely, to get it fixed.” He added that the “federal government is not at all involved with what has taken place, but we can fix it.”
A section of the sewer line collapsed in January in Montgomery County, Maryland, sending more than 200 million gallons of wastewater into the Potomac. Although DC Water — the public utility that’s responsible for the District’s drinking water, wastewater collection and sewage treatment — has diverted the wastewater spill and is working to sanitize the water, it didn’t manage to do so before the wastewater severely tainted the Potomac with high levels of E. coli and other bacteria. DC Water is overseen by the Environmental Protection Agency.
“This is a Radical Left caused Environmental Hazard,” the president wrote in his post Tuesday. “With all of their talk about carbon footprints and everything else, they’re allowing hundreds of tons of sewage to pour into the Mighty Potomac, making it much less mighty. ACT FAST. I am awaiting your call.”
The president placed most of the blame for the spill squarely on Moore and Democratic officials in Maryland. He said over the weekend that the Federal Emergency Management Agency is responding to the incident, but that the ongoing funding lapse for its parent agency, the Department of Homeland Security, is affecting the agency.
But on Tuesday, Moore said it’s the federal government that has long been responsible for the sewage project.
“I know this is breaking news to everyone, but the president is not telling the truth,” Moore told reporters in Maryland. “Because what you’re looking at with the Piedmont sewage project, that’s not something that the federal government has had responsibility for for the past year; it’s not something that the federal government has had responsibility for the past decade — in fact, the federal government has had responsibility for that for the past century.”
He added that Maryland Department of the Environment workers were, in fact, among the first to respond to the spill, testing the water quality and sewage. And Moore said the EPA declined to join a congressional briefing that Maryland officials had invited the agency to join.
“Now that it is essentially 99% contained, I love the fact that the president of the United States is finally realizing that this was his job, and he hasn’t been doing it for the past month,” Moore added. “So I say, ‘Listen, we’d welcome you to help to address the remaining 1% that hasn’t been complete while we’ve been doing your job.'”
Mr. Trump has made it clear recently he’s no fan of Moore. The Maryland governor is of two Democrats whom Mr. Trump deemed “not worthy” to be invited to an annual White House meeting and dinner with governors from both parties this week. Moore discussed the slight with CBS News during a “Things That Matter” town hall that aired Sunday night.
He shrugged off the White House snub, saying that “if the point of the meeting is to turn it into name-calling … I will not go.”
In another social media post, the president called Moore “foul mouthed,” criticized his performance as Maryland governor and accused him of lying about receiving a military medal. Moore said Mr. Trump’s post was “full of lies” and “unhinged.”
“I will work with anyone. But I will bow down to no one,” Moore told CBS News. “And I think the president has a problem with that.”
CBS News has reached out to DC Water, D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser’s office, the Maryland Department of Environmental Quality, Moore’s office, Virginia Gov. Abigail Spanberger’s office, the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality and the EPA for comment.
“The damaged portion of sewage infrastructure is owned and operated by DC Water, and the location of the break is in Montgomery County, MD,” the Virginia Department of Environmental Quality told CBS News.
The Potomac Interceptor was built as a result of a law Congress passed in 1960 that authorized the District of Columbia to construct, operate and maintain a sewer line connecting Dulles to the Washington, D.C. sewer system, according to DC Water.
