Election 2016: Members Speak Out
Joe Burgess
Local 14693
Joe (Jo Jo) Burgess, 46, of Washington, Pa., is recording secretary and a unit president of Local 14693 at Pennsylvania Transformer Technology, Inc., a manufacturer of power transformers and voltage regulators for utilities and industrial markets. A U.S. Army veteran who served in the Gulf War, Burgess is married with three children.
“This election is important to all of us for our future. We need someone like Hillary Clinton who has shown throughout her career that she is there to help working families and poor families.
“If she’s not elected, the earnings gap is going to be further widened in this county. She will help people bridge the gap, and I think that’s the biggest reason why she needs to be president. If she is not elected, that (income) gap is going to be further widened. This country is going to separate like the medieval times, where you had your kings and peasants, pretty much. The working people will turn into peasants.
“I believe Hillary is the candidate that will take this country in the right direction. Over the last eight years, Barack Obama has rebuilt the economy and the job market. She can only make it better, and build upon what he has already done.”
Burgess expects Clinton as president would make favorable appointments to the National Labor Relations Board and other agencies and appoint to the Supreme Court justices who will be good for working families.
“Whenever you can level the playing field with laws and things like that it strengthens us, gives us the ability to go out and prove that organizing works, and that labor movement is a positive movement in this country.”
“Hillary Clinton is going to create a system that is fair to everybody even if that means taxing the upper one percent and leveling that playing field.
“She is labor friendly. Whenever you have a president that is pro-labor, that helps the labor movement. It makes it easier for us to organize and get our numbers back up.
“She has shown her character through helping people with their living standards and quality of life. She is going to help bridge the income gap, the gap that we have right now. The middle class is eroding at a rapid pace and she is going to slow that down.
“I think she will, with her administration, build on what President Obama has done and create a true middle class where we can live and have a positive society.”
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