Health Care
Healthcare is a right and integral to our ability to live and enjoy life. We must preserve it.
The Environment
We must fight to ensure that generations from now can enjoy the great outdoors of Pennsylvania.
As the former Director of Policy for Planned Parenthood, Amanda is unflinchingly committed to the reproductive rights of pregnant people. Time and again, the legislature has attempted to chip and strip away the right of a person to choose. Amanda has repeatedly fought back against those attempts and demanded that politics stay out of the doctor’s office. Amanda believes that all individuals have the right to make decisions about their bodies without the interference of the government. As Senator, Amanda will stand up against any legislation that interferes with a person’s right to choose.
According to recent studies, Pennsylvania ranks 24th in the nation in gender pay disparity and is not projected to pay men and women equally for doing the same job until 2072! Amanda supports proposed legislation to modernize Pennsylvania’s 1959 Equal Pay Act in order to broaden the scope of the law and protect workers’ rights and end the gender gap in income.
While less than one-third of elected members of the state’s legislature are women, Amanda recognizes that the basic issue of equal respect should not depend on numbers. Rather, we must end once and for all the crisis of discrimination, dismissiveness, and sexual harassment that emanates from a cultural mind-set that has pervaded our society and our state capitol unabated – until now. Amanda stands with men and women who have proclaimed that such behavior has to stop now and without exception.
Amanda supports legislation that would ensure working parents are provided with basic workplace accommodations to breastfeed or pump in private quarters. In addition, Amanda will promote legislation that gives parents opportunities to take time from work following labor and delivery without losing their pay or their job.
The opioid epidemic is one of the worst public health crises facing Pennsylvanians today. According to Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro, the opioid, heroin, and fentanyl epidemic kills 12 Pennsylvanians every day. Amanda supports the recent settlement that will provide more than $50 billion to the Commonwealth thanks to a lawsuit brought against several large drug distributors. She also recognizes that more has to be done to curtail drug use, provide assistance to those who are in need of recovery, expand access to treatment, and enact criminal justice reforms for those whose lives are caught in the destructive web of drug abuse.
Amanda was raised in a union household, where she learned the integral role organized labor has played in the lives of Pennsylvanians. Unions have provided workers with a 40-hour work week, sick leave, child labor laws, workplace safety, and a minimum wage. She whole-heartedly supports the right of workers to organize and collectively bargain on behalf of the workforce, which is the cornerstone of fair labor. Amanda will fight against a myriad of proposed anti-union legislation, including the obnoxiously worded right-to-work legislation meant to undermine workers’ right to organize.
In addition, Amanda adamantly supports raising the minimum wage. Since 2009, 29 states have raised their minimum wage. Meanwhile, Pennsylvania remains at the bottom of the scale, with the lowest minimum wage allowed by law in the country. As Senator, Amanda supports proposed legislation to increase the wage to $15.00 an hour in order to ensure that all working Pennsylvanians are making a viable living wage.
Gun violence has taken an immeasurable toll on our society. Too many children’s lives have been cut short. Too many families have grieved the loss of a loved one due. Too many communities have been torn apart. Thoughts and prayers cannot prevent another mass shooting. We must act. We must stand up to the gun lobby. We owe it to every family that has been touched by gun violence. Amanda will be a proactive leader on gun control working to close loopholes in gun legislation, pass red flag laws, ban assault weapons, limit the amount of ammunition and the number of guns that can be purchased at once, and work with colleagues from both parties to fight gun violence.