Published: July 18, 2008 11:05 am      

CONGRESS: Davis makes Albion appearance

Congressman hopeful Jack Davis stood outside the former injected rubber plant on Platt Street in Albion on Thursday morning with a political message.

“Free trade is not free,” he began. A placard on his podium read “Save Jobs,” the Democrat’s campaign motto. “It’s time to put working people first.”

GM, Ford and Chrysler have announced the closing of more plants, he said. The loss of jobs is devastating to families.

“In our region, too many working men and women have had to explain to their families that they lost their job because it was cheaper to do the work in China or Mexico,” Davis said. “We don’t need more of the same policies that have given us the worst economy since the Great Depression.”

Davis spoke out against GOP presidential candidate Sen. John McCain’s claim that “free trade is indispensable to our prosperity,” citing the largest jump in unemployment in 22 years, record gas prices and the looming mortgage crisis.

Between 2001 and 2007, U.S. imports from China tripled, and more than 2.5 million American manufacturing jobs have been cut, he said.

The solution, he believes, is good-paying jobs that will keep taxes low and communities safe. Lobbyists, corporations and trade associations have too much power in Washington as they push Congress to pass more free trade deals, he said.

“Special interest money doesn’t impress me,” Davis said. “I am the only candidate to have joined Barack Obama in rejecting lobbyist and PAC money for my campaign, and I am the only candidate pledging to work for a dollar a year. ... We cannot keep doing the same thing ... and expect different results.”

At the end of his brief speech, Davis thanked those in attendance before heading back to his campaign office.

A native Western New Yorker, Davis graduated from the state University at Buffalo in 1955 with an engineering degree. He started his own manufacturing company, I Squared R Element Co. Inc., in 1964, a venture that made him a millionaire.

Davis ran against incumbent Congressman Tom Reynolds, R-Clarence, in 2004 and 2006. Reynolds announced this year that he will be retiring at the end of his term.

There are two others running against Davis for the 26th District congressional seat in the September Democratic primary, Iraq War veteran Jon Powers and environmental attorney Alice Kryzan. Erie County Legislator Kathy Konst, also a Democrat, previously announced she’d run for the House seat, too, but instead has filed petitions to run for state Senate in the 59th district.

Anthony L. Fumerelle filed for the Independence line in the congressional race.

The winning candidate will face Republican businessman Christopher J. Lee in November.

Contact reporter Nicole Coleman at 798-1400, ext. 8227.