McGinty can’t have it both ways
Fellow Pennsylvanians do not be deceived. Katie McGinty is trying to have it both ways. She has made sweeping declarations that she stands with coal miners and their families.
Yet, it is McGinty who is supporting Hillary Clinton and backs her agenda of putting coal miners out of work. McGinty is also conveniently omitting her actual long track record of efforts to kill our national and state coal industry.
In 1996, President Clinton moved to kill a mining project by designating a mineral rich portion of Utah a national monument. Inconveniently, this whole project was the idea of Katie McGinty who was serving as the chairwoman of the Council on Environmental Quality during this period. In the wake of the move, Leon Panetta who was serving as President Clinton’s chief of staff, referred to McGinty actions as “sneaky.”
McGinty has also long been an ardent supporter of the cap and trade energy tax, despite many of her colleagues in the Democratic Party insisting that such an energy policy would be destructive to the economy. Members of the nonpartisan Pennsylvania Public Utility Commission warned that a cap and trade tax would cost Pennsylvania 66,000 coal and energy jobs.
U.S. Sen. Pat Toomey, R-Pa., on the other hand, believes that coal is an absolutely essential part of Pennsylvania and America’s future. Despite the aggressive regulation by the Environmental Protection Agency that has put hundreds of Pennsylvanians out of jobs, Sen. Toomey has worked hard to oppose those regulations. Toomey has also pledged to vote for the Miners Protection Act that will preserve miners’ health care benefits. This is a key piece of legislation for those in our area who have worked so hard in the coal industry. This legislation fulfills a promise made by President Truman in 1946.
McGinty would have us forget this promise. McGinty wants to crush the coal industry and the hardworking men and women who have helped to make this country. Do not be misled by McGinty’s “sneaky” ways. Toomey supports commonsense policies to help all Pennsylvanians succeed. Join me in voting for Sen. Pat Toomey in the fall.
Melany Chrash
Uniontown.