As a father of three, a husband, and the son of a mother who raised me on her own, I know what it means to care for people. Day in and day out, I care for the students and staff at my job as a porter at St. John’s University, work to put food on the table at my humble West Farms, Bronx apartment, and to make sure my kids have a safe bed to sleep in at night.

 

Because I care so much, the thought of having, for four more years, a president who clearly doesn’t care about the lives of workers around him frightens me like nothing else.

 

That’s why I am volunteering through my union, SEIU 32BJ, to help elect a president who has true compassion for essential workers like me – Joe Biden.

 

The months since the coronavirus pandemic started have been the hardest of my life.

 

Mid-April, I received a letter from my employer telling me that I was furloughed. I relied on my unemployment benefits and my wife’s paycheck to make ends meet. I was one of the lucky ones to return to work a few months later thanks to my employer, but I understand the sick feeling you get in your stomach, what millions of others – still out of work – feel, when you wonder how you’ll be able to take care of your family.

 

By May, I had lost five family members due to coronavirus-related complications. At the time, there was no mandate to wear masks, and there still isn’t one, in most of the country. Most of us have learned that this simple gesture can go a long way to curb the spread of the disease. But for this president, that’s too much to ask even when he knows he has had COVID-19, and can transmit it to others.

Over the past four years, and especially during this pandemic, President Donald Trump has only taken care of himself and his rich friends, and has forgotten about the workers who keep New York City and the rest of the country running. How can he, so selfishly, talk about holding up another stimulus [bill] until after the election, when so many people remain out of work, and many more may be laid off?

 

All I wanted to see was a leader who cared about the people of this nation just as much as I cared for my family – and he simply does not care. We need a change. We cannot take four more years of being abandoned without resources and protections.

 

That’s why I am taking whatever hours I can to text and call voters in New York, Pennsylvania and elsewhere, to make sure they are registered to vote, and to ask them to vote for Joe Biden – someone who knows the challenges of raising a family, and the problems we face every day as regular Americans. He supports raising the minimum wage to $15, making healthcare accessible to everyone, and most importantly, he cares about us and he works for us.

 

I carry extra voter registration cards in my back pocket every time I leave my house, because I care that much about making sure we all have a voice in making a better future for all of us.

 

Keith Lopez is a porter, and a member of 32BJ SEIU.