2 Democrats compete to take on Republican Congressman Guy Reschenthaler
PITTSBURGH (KDKA) -- While the race in one congressional district is getting lots of attention, there's another contested primary in the Pittsburgh region. Democrats in the 14th District are picking a candidate to take on an incumbent Republican congressman.
The 14th Congressional District includes all of Fayette, Greene and Washington counties and most of Indiana, Somerset and Westmoreland counties. It is represented by Congressman Guy Reschenthaler, who is the reason both Democrats -- Chris Dziados and Ken Bach -- say they're running for Congress.
"First off, he's not even from the district. He moved here, carpetbagger in my opinion, moved here to run. He doesn't even know us. He's running basically on 'I support Trump. Whatever Trump says, that's what I'm going to do,'" Bach said of Reschenthaler.
Bach grew up in Westmoreland County, was in the Navy, served 12 years on the Yough school board and owns his own car repair shop.
"I own an auto repair shop, basically hands on, fixing cars, getting cars on the road. That's what I say about this job. I fix things for a living. Congress is broken. I can go fix it," Bach said.
Dziados, who grew up in Indiana County and now lives in Washington County, recently retired from the military after two tours in Iraq and the Pentagon. He says it's wrong that nobody ran against Reschenthaler after he voted against counting Pennsylvania's presidential votes and against President Biden's bills to bring money and jobs back to this district.
"Guy Reschenthaler, back in 2020, he voted to not certify the presidential election and wasn't challenged in '22 and hasn't been held accountable for those decisions," Dziados said.
"He didn't support the Infrastructure Jobs Act, the CHIPS and Science Act, things that will bring real legislation that will bring real, good-paying jobs back to southwest Pennsylvania."
KDKA-TV's Jon Delano asked both candidates why Democrats should nominate them.
Dziados: "My last five years in the military I spent in the Pentagon developing national security policy. I had to work with the administration. I had to work with the Congress, and I had to work across the federal government itself."
Bach: "I am the better person to represent the 14th District. I believe I'm the person that can take on Guy Reschenthaler, and I won't be afraid to take him on."
Reschenthaler, of course, disputes the Democrats' characterization of him, and he is running unopposed in the Republican primary. Democrats will choose between Bach and Dziados on April 23.