'They play-act': Jon Stewart torches JD Vance and Tucker Carlson over Ohio train derailment

Jon Stewart did not mince words when he slammed both Fox News' Tucker Carlson and Sen. J.D. Vance (R-Ohio) for their reaction to the Ohio train derailment.

According to Stewart, although both expressed outrage, their actions offer very little proactive effort to help those affected by the disturbing series of events. Stewart made the remarks on Wednesday, February 15 during his podcast, "The Problem with Jon Stewart."

Stewart held a discussion with writers Alexa Loftus and Henrik Blix, who also weighed in on the trail derailment which took place in East Palestine, OH causing a spilling of an array of toxic chemicals.

At one point, Stewart said, "Here’s the thing, the toughest part, it's that view on the ground of those folks. The people who live in that town who are like, 'We don’t know what to do.' There are so many — when you think about the general emergencies that hit places, there is a sense of, 'Oh, there’s a protocol for this. I understand what to do. We understand the devastation. We know how to clean it up. We know how to rebuild, we know how to rebound.' With this, it's the uncertainty where they're just sitting there like, 'Can I eat the food?'"

"Yeah," Loftus concurred. "And I think with that uncertainty, the default that people go to, whether it's leadership or the people on the ground, is like, it's better if we just decide it's okay."

"You know, like, this isn't that big a deal. And like maybe it'll be cheaper if we just decide that it's over. But where I feel like if we all just could agree on like the worst case scenario that would actually — I don't know," Loftus said.

"Why don't we all just assume that this is terrible for people and act accordingly," Stewart added.

"Like, listen, 'We tested the — my guess is it's not going to seep into your produce, so carry on. And, because the reason is the things that this will cause you won't see for maybe, years. Right. You know, and so by then, who the f*ck knows where we'll be? So why bother?'" Stewart said.

Stewart and his guests also agreed that outrage only emerges when it comes to the possibility of war.

"I'm so annoyed at, you know, you've got some of these like very on the right, populist figures talking about how we've gotta fix this. Meanwhile, these are the motherf*ckers that would never spend money on infrastructure that always shoot those budgets down, that make it impossible for any government to regulate anything," Stewart said.

"And they’re out there, you know, J.D. Vance is out there, 'This infrastructure bill doesn't do that. And the working people–' Well tell your f*cking judges! Tell all the people you appoint then, to put some teeth into the regulatory state that can force these rail companies to make the changes that they need to make, to make these safe for workers and safe for the middle-class people that are living in these towns," he added.

"Man, they get up on that high horse, 'The Biden administration,' and they're — 'This, inflation reduction act won't fix it.' Well, you know what caused it in the first place? Your f*cking policies. Man, that drives me nuts," Stewart said.

Blix then turned his attention to the Ohio lawmaker saying, "Vance is a venture capitalist. What side of this do you think he comes down on? The hedge funds that own this or the people in these small towns."

"He and Tucker go on and they play-act," Stewart said. "They play-act this concern for working people and populism. Meanwhile, everything that they put in place politically in their infrastructure is against regulatory improvements and help for working-class people. It’s baloney."