Christine Toretti: Blue-collar workers stepped up for us; let's step up for them

Pennsylvania manufacturers helped save countless American lives during the coronavirus pandemic — the least we can do in return is to help protect their jobs in the upcoming presidential election.

As the coronavirus outbreak spread throughout the world, many health care experts and journalists speculated that the U.S. would not be prepared to cope with the devastating disease. They even mocked President Trump for his confidence that American industry would step up in time to meet our needs.

“Coronavirus outbreak in China could lead to ‘critical’ shortages of medical products in the U.S.,” CNN wrote in late February, arguing that our country’s reliance on Chinese-made medical devices could make it difficult for hospitals to treat covid-19 patients. Time issued a similar warning, noting that “there aren’t enough medical masks to fight coronavirus” amid unprecedented global demand.

These were legitimate concerns, given our reliance on supply chains from China and the previous administration’s failure to restock the national emergency stockpile, but they overlooked the ingenuity and resilience of America’s domestic manufacturing sector and the blue collar workers who do so much to make this country great.

From the earliest days of the pandemic, the federal government has formed partnerships with manufacturers in industrial states such as Pennsylvania, providing guidance on how they can help produce vital medical supplies, including personal protective equipment and all-important ventilators, to prevent potential shortages.

“American industry is stepping up,” Trump announced in early April. “Manufacturers are really going to town. And we have thousands of ventilators being built as we speak, and we have hundreds that are being sent to different locations, and we’re ready to roll with almost 10,000 that we have in the federal stockpile.”

At the time, the president’s critics were howling about his refusal to use the Defense Production Act to place entire industries under government control, but he stuck to his free-market guns, and he was proven right.

Early last month, the Pennsylvania Manufacturer’s Association and the state’s Department of Community and Economic Development unveiled a program to help local factories convert their production to critical medical supplies, and identified deficiencies in the medical supply chain. The result of that collaboration, the Pennsylvania Manufacturing Call to Action Portal, has also helped manufacturers find new workers and address other workforce needs. It produced a win-win situation for manufacturers and hospitals and nursing homes in critical need for personal protective equipment.

“Throughout our commonwealth’s history, our manufacturing sector has answered the call to move us forward and contributed tremendously in times of turbulence,” Gov. Tom Wolf said at the time. “I call upon our private sector to be a part of the solution to this crisis.”

But even though America’s manufacturing sector rose to the challenge posed by covid-19 and prevented catastrophic shortages of medical equipment throughout the country, the fate of the manufacturing workers currently being hailed as “essential” remains distressingly uncertain. Progressive politicians in Washington, including presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden, continue to support radical environmental regulations that would gut Pennsylvania’s manufacturing and energy industries.

A recent study from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce estimated that Biden’s proposed ban on hydraulic fracking would destroy more than 600,000 Pennsylvania jobs and suck $261 billion out of the state’s economy by 2025.

“Development of the Marcellus and Utica Shales has transformed Pennsylvania into the nation’s second-largest producer of natural gas over the past decade, spurring meaningful local job creation and investment in infrastructure and manufacturing,” the study observed, noting that a fracking ban would deprive the Keystone State of this valuable resource.

It would be a travesty to abandon our state’s blue-collar workers this November after all they’ve done to keep us safe during the coronavirus pandemic. A vote for Donald Trump is a vote to show our nation’s gratitude to the heroes who are helping us make it through this crisis.

Christine Toretti is a businesswoman, philanthropist, 2016 U.S. presidential elector and Republican National Committee member from Indiana, Pa.