Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg’s response to Donald Trump’s refusal to accept any responsibility for the impact his massive deregulations have had went viral on Thursday as video of him encouraging the ex-president to support the Biden administration’s efforts went viral.

During his visit to the scene of the Norfolk Southern train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio on Thursday, a reporter asked Secretary Buttigieg, “You mentioned the national political figures decided to get involved, it sounds like you’re talking about Trump. And then you said, ‘I need your help.’ How can he help?”

Buttigieg replied, “Well, one thing he could do is express support for reversing the deregulation that happened on his watch. I heard him say he had ‘nothing to do with it,’ even though it was in his administration. So if he had nothing to do with it, and they did it in his administration against his will, maybe he could come out and say that, that he supports us moving in a different direction.”

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“We’re not afraid to own our policies when it comes to raising the bar on regulation,” Buttigieg continued. “And I’ve got to think that him indicating that this is something that everybody ,no matter how much you disagree on politics and presidential campaigns, can get behind – higher fines, tougher regulations on safety, Congress on tying our hands on breaking rules, all the other things that go with it that’d be a nice thing for him to do.”

Buttigieg: One thing Trump can do is express support for reversing the deregulation that happened on his watch. I heard him say he had nothing to do with it. So if he had nothing to do with it.. pic.twitter.com/GclGYPOm3l

— Acyn (@Acyn) February 23, 2023

Buttigieg was referring to Trump’s visit to the East Palestine just one day earlier, where instead of tossing paper towels at homeless hurricane victims Trump handed out red MAGA caps at McDonald’s and used “Trump”-branded bottled water to ensure voters knew he had been there.

During Trump’s Wednesday visit a reporter asked him about the train derailment, which resulted in the release of toxic gases under the direction of GOP Govern or Mike DeWine. She mentioned his “pulling back rail regulations” when he was president, something he did indeed do.

“I had nothing to do with it,” Trump insisted.

Instead, the ex-president quickly blamed the “airports” on Buttigieg, claiming they are like “a third world nation,” although Trump never improved them on his watch and the Biden administration actually passed and signed into law a massive infrastructure bill, one that Trump was never able to pass.

Donald Trump responds to Transportation Sec. Pete Buttigieg pointing out that his administration rolled back regulations on the rail industry:

“I had nothing to do with it.” pic.twitter.com/0VT4zgVU8k

— The Recount (@therecount) February 22, 2023

The Recount on Wednesday, pointing to an ABC News article, noted that the “Trump administration withdrew regulations connected to ‘high hazard’ trains, which critics say made it more likely a derailment like the kind in East Palestine would happen.”

Meanwhile, Buttigieg’s response to Trump’s remarks have gone viral. In just 24 hours the video (above) of Buttigieg has garnered nearly 2 million views.

Journalists, critics, and commentators on social media are praising the Transportation Secretary.

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“Never really understood why Republicans think picking fights with him is a good idea,” HuffPost White House correspondent S.V. Dáte tweeted. “He is hands down the Biden administration’s best communicator, he takes apart the criticism, turns them back on the critics, and does it all without sounding mad.”

“Absolutely incredible,” said podcaster and former Biden delegate Victor Shi. “Pete Buttigieg proves once again why he remains one of the best communicators and assets Democrats have. Very few people can respond to journalists and call out Republicans as effectively as Pete Buttigieg.”

Social media influencer and political commentator JoJoFromJerz, who has over 780,000 followers on Twitter called it “an absolute masterclass on how to handle donald j. trump.”

And author Tod Goldberg noted, “When Pete starts to smile, you know you’re about to find yourself in the ‘find out’ portion of the show.”

Watch the videos of Buttigieg and Trump above or at this link.

Rep.-elect George Santos (R-NY), who is under investigation for extensively lying to voters about his resume, may have also made possible false statements about being half-Black and his mother dying in connection to the September 11, 2001 terrorist attack on the World Trade Center.

Roger Sollenberger, a political reporter for The Daily Beast, uncovered tweets Santos published on July 3, 2020 from his official congressional campaign’s Twitter account in which he identified as bi-racial, writing, “[Martin Luther King Jr.] did not die for us to go back to segregation. As a biracial person I stand tall against segregation of any kind. This so-called ‘black anthem’ is the most divisive thing I’ve ever seen.”

Sidestepping the fact that the August 2017 Unite the Right white supremacist rally was likely the most divisive thing that most Americans have ever seen, Santos’ tweet likely refers to “Lift Every Voice”, an early 20th century song which has been recognized as a Black National Anthem. Following the nationwide protests against the May 2020 police murder of Black Minneapolis resident George Floyd, the NFL and NASCAR briefly incorporated the song into their pre-game musical performances.

When a Twitter user asked Santos to clarify what he meant by identifying as “biracial,” Santos responded, “Caucasian and Black.”

Two years ago George Santos claimed to be half Black (h/t @C00KE_) pic.twitter.com/fgGNstGeAw

— Roger Sollenberger (@SollenbergerRC) December 29, 2022

It’s unclear whether this claim is actually a falsehood. Robert Mackey, a reporter for The Intercept found a picture of Santos embracing a dark-skinned man along with the caption, “Happy Father’s Day to all the dads out there.” But it’s unclear whether the man in the photo is his father or someone else’s dad.

This could be the only thing that's not a lie – if this Instagram photo is genuinely his dad pic.twitter.com/LTkFXDgOlt

— Robert Mackey (@RobertMackey) December 29, 2022

Also under scrutiny is Santos’ claims about his Jewish heritage. In a February 2020 interview, he claimed that his grandfather fled Nazi persecution in Ukraine, married a woman he met in Belgium, and then moved to Brazil.

“Santos said his mother’s family’s historical Jewish name was ‘Zabrovsky,’ and later appeared to operate a GoFundMe campaign for a pet charity (which he falsely claimed was a 501(c)(3) nonprofit) under that alias,” CNN reported. “Genealogists CNN previously spoke with found no evidence of Jewish or Ukrainian heritage in his family tree.”

Santos also previously said, “My mother fled socialism in Europe,” but genealogical records show that his mother was born in Brazil.

Regarding his mother, in a July 12, 2021 tweet, Santos wrote, “9/11 claimed my mother’s life.” He had previously said that his mother was working in the World Trade Center on the day of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.

The now-deleted bio on his campaign website said, “She survived the horrific events of that day, but unfortunately passed away a few years later.”

Apparently, “a few years later” meant 15 years later, and it’s unclear if her death had any connection whatsoever to the attacks.

“I am not a fraud. I am not a fake. I didn't materialize from thin air.” —George Santos 1 day ago. pic.twitter.com/pExdIMlp52

— No Lie with Brian Tyler Cohen (@NoLieWithBTC) December 29, 2022

Santos also seemingly lied about having attended the Horace Mann preparatory school in the Bronx, New York.

“We’ve searched the records and there is no evidence that George Santos (or any alias) attended Horace Mann,” Ed Adler, a spokesman for the school, told CNN.

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton is running for a third term in office while facing civil and criminal fraud charges for allegedly handly sketchy trade deals, giving office positions to donors, and trying to overturn the 2020 election.

However, a new Associated Press (AP) story paints Paxton’s office as highly political and dysfunctional.

Paxton’s office botched “Operation Fallen Angel,” an investigation that indicted six men on allegations of forcing teen girls to “exchange sexual contact for crystal methamphetamine.” Paxton’s office largely dropped the charges because they lost track of their key witness.

Another prosecutor said he quit Paxton’s office in January after supervisors pressured him to withhold evidence in a murder case, the AP wrote.

Eight of Paxton’s top deputies quit or were fired in autumn 2020 after they went to the FBI to accuse Paxton of using his office to help a donor who had employed a woman that Paxton admitted to having an extramarital affair with. The FBI’s investigation is ongoing.

The AP story notes that Paxton gave a senior role to a California attorney who gave him $10,000 to fight his 2015 securities fraud indictment. Paxton also hired Tom Gleason, a former police officer whose father donated $50,000 to Paxton’s legal defense. Gleason was given a job advising Paxton on child exploitation as well as Medicaid and voter fraud.

Gleason was fired less than two months into his new job. Paxton’s office didn’t explain why, but “three people with knowledge of the matter” told the AP that, during a work presentation at the agency’s Austin headquarters, Gleason played a video of “a man raping a small child” to highlight the difficult work facing child abuse investigators.

“It was met with outrage and caused the meeting to quickly dissolve,” the AP wrote. “Afterward, Paxton’s top deputy, Brent Webster, told staff not to talk about what happened.”

The AP also wrote that before Texas’ March primary elections, Amber Platt, a deputy over criminal justice cases, held a meeting asking lawyers in Paxton’s offices about which upcoming cases that would best help his reelection chances.

Despite all this, Paxton has a five-point lead over his Democratic opponent, Rochelle Garza.