Amidst increasing personal attacks from Rep. Ryan Mackenzie’s (R-Lehigh) campaign, hundreds of union members from across Pennsylvania gathered in Allentown on Saturday to knock on doors and volunteer for Bob Brooks’ (D) congressional campaign.
“ I think it’s cowardice. Instead of talking [about] policy, you watch any of Mackenzie’s ads, it’s attacking Brooks,” Shawn Smith, a Mack Trucks employee and United Auto Workers Local 677 member, told The Keystone.
Related: What is Bob Brooks’ plan to bring jobs to the Lehigh Valley?
Smith was referring to recent calls from Mackenzie’s campaign and Republicans in the Lehigh Valley for investigations by the US Department of Justice, Pennsylvania attorney general’s office, and the Northampton County district attorney’s office into allegations that Brooks lied on an application for a $15,000 COVID-19 grant for his landscaping business and clerical issues on tax documents related to the Pennsylvania Professional Fire Fighters Association’s (PPFFA) charity.
Brooks serves as president of the PPFFA, which represents over 7,000 firefighters and first responders across the commonwealth, and Republicans are alleging that state grants dispersed to the PPFFA charity for a fallen firefighters memorial in Harrisburg were misused.
Firefighters from across the commonwealth condemned the attack, and the PPFFA asserts that every dollar received from the state has been used in the construction of the memorial.
In the past week, Mackenzie’s campaign and the Republican Party have leaned into calls to have Brooks arrested. One mailer sent to voters depicts Brooks wearing an orange prison uniform with a sign that says “Bob Brooks for jail.” The Mackenzie campaign has also printed signs that say “Stop the Crooks, Investigate Brooks.”
“There’s nothing about policy, nothing about what he’s done, nothing about what he wants to do,” Smith said.
“But if you watch the Brooks ads, everything’s about what he wants to do and where the direction we have to go in DC. It’s definitely night and day on the way their campaigns are being run.”
Prior to running for Congress, Brooks worked for over 20 years as a firefighter with the city of Bethlehem and has built a coalition that includes different factions of the Democratic Party, and picked up endorsements from Gov. Josh Shapiro (D) and US Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.).
Some of the unions in attendance included the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees (AFSCME), Service Employees International Union (SEIU), the Pennsylvania Association of Staff Nurses and Allied Professionals (PASNAP), the International Association of Sheet Metal, Air, Rail and Transportation Workers (SMART), and those affiliated with the Philadelphia branch of the AFL-CIO, the largest federation of labor unions.
“I don’t say his name a whole lot because it really makes my skin crawl, but Ryan Mackenzie does not have this,” Brooks told the union members.
“The people that pretend to be his friends, they’re really not, when I have a ton of brothers and sisters running around this joint for us.”
Brooks supports reversing President Donald Trump’s $1 trillion Medicaid cut and $187 billion cut to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP). The cuts are projected to result in 17,519 residents losing health coverage and another 6,000 losing SNAP benefits, according to
Brooks also backs Medicare for All and the Protecting the Right to Organize (PRO) Act, which would expand collective bargaining rights and make it easier for workers to form unions.
Related: Bob Brooks wants to end the Iran war and Trump’s tariffs to drive down costs
“We’re going to win this big, and we’re going to send a message that we’re tired of being screwed with,” Brooks said. “We are done with the nonsense, we are done with the corruption, and we are done with the lies, done with the cruelty.”
For Daniel Bauder, president of the Philadelphia AFL-CIO, making the bus trip to the Lehigh Valley in support of Brooks was a no-brainer.
“ We need people like Bob Brooks who understand what it is that working people need,” Bauder said in an interview.
He added that “we’ve got plenty of good candidates running for office,” but said Brooks stands out for his “conviction” and “clarity” and ability to articulate the needs of working- and middle-class people. “That’s the kind of people that we need at every level of government,” Bauder said
