'He Meant It': Wes Moore Praises Biden For Helping 'Every Step Of The Way' After FSK Bridge Collapse

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During a Biden-Harris event in Wisconsin, Gov. Wes Moore (D-MD) praised President Biden for the aid he provided him to help rebuild the Francis Scott Key Bridge after it collapsed in March.  Fuel your success with Forbes. Gain unlimited access to premium journalism, including breaking news, groundbreaking in-depth reported stories, daily digests and more. Plus, members get a front-row seat at members-only events with leading thinkers and doers, access to premium video that can help you get ahead, an ad-light experience, early access to select products including NFT drops and more:  https://account.forbes.com/membership/?utm_source=youtube&utm_medium=display&utm_campaign=growth_non-sub_paid_subscribe_ytdescript   Stay Connected Forbes on Facebook: http://fb.com/forbes Forbes Video on Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/forbes Forbes Video on Instagram: http://instagram.com/forbes More From Forbes:  http://forbes.com

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00:00And that happened about three months ago.

00:03I woke up at 2 or 2 in the morning.

00:06My phone rang.

00:07My chief of staff let me know that a ship that was the size

00:14of three football fields, that was so heavy,

00:18no, it was a container ship.

00:19So it brings containers from port to port.

00:23Each one of those containers is about 1 and 1

00:25half to 2 and 1 half tons.

00:28That ship, the Dali, had 4,000 containers on it.

00:35That's how big this ship was.

00:38And I was slammed into one of the most iconic bridges

00:41inside of our state, how the port of Baltimore,

00:43which is responsible for 13% of our economy,

00:47was now shut down, that we had tens of thousands

00:51of tons of steel that was now sitting

00:53at the bottom of the Pasco River,

00:56mangled, that we had a port that was closed,

01:00that by the way, tens of thousands of workers

01:03worked at that port, that a bridge that

01:07had around 40,000 people who crossed it every single day

01:10was now gone.

01:13And by the way, they also let me know

01:16that we had six bodies that were running out.

01:21And as I'm sitting there and calling and I'm mobilizing,

01:23we're trying to get, we've got the Maryland State Police,

01:25we've got our divers in the water within an hour

01:27to try to save lives, the Maryland Transportation

01:30Police that were on the bridge.

01:31And I cannot say enough how important

01:33they have been, because they saved countless lives

01:36that night.

01:36Amen.

01:37Amen.

01:38Amen.

01:41And we're trying to figure out what

01:42we're going to do with the fact that there are thousands

01:44of workers who now are about to wake up in a few hours

01:46and realize they do not have a job.

01:49And we're sitting there, we're mobilizing,

01:51we're moving things around, we're

01:52making calls and trying to make sure that everybody

01:54is on task and on mission.

01:58My first phone call from the White House came at 3.30.

02:01That's right.

02:04And at a time when my job is to look at my state

02:09and to give them a sense of calm,

02:13to give them a sense of certainty,

02:16I cannot stress enough that from the very beginning of this,

02:20that's exactly what the President of the United States

02:22gave me.

02:23Yes.

02:23That's right.

02:24He gave you faith.

02:25When the President of the United States says to me, he says,

02:28God, we're going to be with you every step of the way.

02:32Amen.

02:33Amen.

02:34Amen.

02:35Amen.

02:36Amen.

02:37Amen.

02:38Amen.

02:39Amen.

02:40Amen.

02:41Amen.

02:41And now we're telling the next generation of people

02:43of our state that we are going to give closure

02:47to these families.

02:47It took five weeks, but we were able to find

02:49all the remains of the six individuals, the six Marylanders

02:53who we lost, and be able to give their families a sense of closure

02:56that they needed and they deserved.

02:59At a time when people were concerned

03:01about what the unemployment rate was going

03:03to be for the state of Maryland in the 80s,

03:05because there's like tens of thousands of jobs,

03:07people who no longer had jobs.

03:08And we said, we're going to work together

03:09with the private sector.

03:10And the private sector committed they would not let people off.

03:13We made sure we had the Department of Labor

03:15that was working to give people the benefits they needed

03:17to serve.

03:18When people were saying, we're not

03:20sure the unemployment rate for Maryland

03:21is going to be in April because of that.

03:23Well, here was the answer.

03:25In the month of April, once again,

03:27not only did Maryland achieve amongst the lowest

03:30unemployment rates in the entire country,

03:32during the month of April, Maryland actually

03:34gained over 7,000.

03:35All right.

03:36Woo!

03:37Woo!

03:38Woo!

03:39Woo!

03:40Woo!

03:41Woo!

03:41And we said, we need to get that channel reopened.

03:43I remember that first morning.

03:44It was wild.

03:44People told me, they were like, I said,

03:46how long is this thing going to take to clear the channel?

03:48And I said, this could take up to a year.

03:51I said, oh, no, it's not.

03:52I'm like, I've got a thousand workers.

03:56I'm like, no, it's not.

03:58What do we need to do to make you alive?

04:02And we were working 24-7, around the clock,

04:08with multiple units and assets.

04:11Over 1,000 people were working around the clock.

04:15And what they told us was it was going to take 11 months.

04:18We got the Port of Baltimore reopened in 11 weeks.

04:22Woo!

04:23Woo!

04:24Woo!

04:25Woo!

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