well, administration, no. i mean this is individual congresswomen that have taken it upon their own because they care. we ve had a lot of people that have come down and it is mostly it is initiative from them that have helped us and brought us to the table to even have a conversation with bp. you know? we wish you all the best and we re going to stay on it. thank you. we appreciate it. we will stay in touch with you and with your fellow oystermen. we appreciate you for having us. this is what it s going to take, people like yourself caring enough to bring us out here and exposing, getting the truth out. let s put it that way. thank you for helping us. thank you. coming up next, right here as we continue to keep our eye on the white house, we will get a preview of tomorrow s big hearing with bp executives on capitol hill. this is andrea mitchell reports only on msnbc. [ wind howling ]
ago. tell me about what the real impact is for the oystermen whom you represent. the real impact is our livelihoods is gone and the fact that we don t know what tomorrow s going to bring. we have so many questions, no answers. of course, with bp, we ve talked to them, we ve tried to give them a plan for payment to sustain our families and yet it seems to be just being thrown off all the time. what is the response you get? and whom do you meet with? well, claims adjusters. i meet with the guy that s over the program for bp, mr. willis, and every time we presented our program, when i testified, of course. and we have not gotten a clear answer back from bp yet. it s the same thing that congress goes through. you know?
they re still waiting for a clear answer from bp. you know? is it the check is in the mail? i mean you have not seen real money yet. we saw one $5,000 check, but you know, we spent that was spent before they even wrote the check. you know? we re waiting now. are any of the oystermen able to be employed by bp to help in the clean-up effort? we do have some people employed that s getting there. but we have the majority of them still not employed. we re sitting here looking at contractors coming from other places, and remember, we have a situation mentally, we went through this with katrina. and we have been very adamant with bp. we don t need another road home. that just seems the way that bp wants to take this. you know? it s always, here, we re going to do it and it never happens. this was the year you thought you would finally economically
he drowned in his car. the woman who raquel was trying to help when she waded in the floodwaters, that woman was rescued safely. a moment ago i told you a story of the plight of oystermen in alabama. i ll bring you the conversation i had the one of the oystermen there and how the spill is affecting them.
these shrimpers or oystermen are actually making more money than they would have been fishing. i think the majority at this time are probably doing as well or a little better than what they normally would. but once this is over, it s going to be devastating. this is a great community. this is a community that s fond founded on the fishing industry. although we have a lot of boat building, you know, that goes on and puts a lot of people to work. and people down here work hard. they work for what they get. and they don t want handouts. how do people feel about how the administration and the president have responded to this? well, you know, the president he is human also, just like us. he s not going to physically get out and clean oil up. and i guess he s in a learning mode, you know, learning what to do. i think they mainly are waiting on bp to do it. but as time goes on, if they see