Pipeline Worker Says Biden Destroyed His Job: ‘This Is All I Know How to Do’
PERINO: “... decision to kill the Keystone Pipeline has cost thousands of American workers good paying jobs. Now one of them has a message for the Biden administration.”
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JERNIGAN: “I’ve pipeliner for 21 years. It’s all I know how to do. The recent administration has taken my livelihood from me and expecting me to get a job somewhere else. I’ve got my whole life invested in this.
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PERINO: “Jason Jernigan joins us now. Jason, it’s not easy to come up on television and talk to people about how your livelihood, you feel, has been taken from you. That was a very good paying job. And your son is also in the business. Tell us a little bit about your story.”
JERNIGAN: “Yes, Dana and thank you all for having me, by the way. I’m a third generation oil and gas worker. My son will make it fourth generation. My grandfather worked for Texas and retired and worked for the gas company. My dad is a 45 year member of 798 and he retired in 2010. I’ve been working since 1989. And in 21 years I have invested here in —“
PERINO: “And you had been hired to work on the Keystone Pipeline when then President Biden made the announcement in January and that job went away?”
JERNIGAN: “Yes, ma’am. I was hired previously a few months ago when President Trump signed off work to go and was hired to work and was supposed to start next month. I was actually hired on the Keystone when President Obama was in office and it got canceled that time.” [crosstalk]
HEMMER: “It’s unbelievable. Jason, what do you do now? How are you going to make a living?”
JERNIGAN: “That’s a good question, Mr. Bill. I don’t have an answer for that. I’m 45 years old. This is all I know how to do. I spent my whole life learning this craft and this skill and it’s not as easy as somebody might think or people might think to just start all over at 45 years old. I guess could possibly get a job as a greeter at Walmart, I don’t know. I don’t have an answer for that. I really don’t.”
PERINO: “What did you think when Climate Czar John Kerry, former Secretary of State suggested that people like you at 45, instead of starting over that you could just get a different job in solar panels?”
JERNIGAN: “Well, it’s really — first of all I haven’t again offered a job in the solar panel industry and haven’t been sent an application, or a phone number or anything. I don’t know what I have to do to do the work and the ground work and everything it takes to get there. And secondly, I mean, I’ve done the research, if I went to work for a solar panel right now I would be taking a $35 an hour pay cut and lose my benefits and — and retirement.”
PERINO: “Jason, we have you in our thoughts and prayers and also we’re going to keep talking about this story and advocating for you.”
JERNIGAN: “Thank you guys. Thank you.”
PERINO: “Thank you.”
HEMMER “Thank you, Jason.” [crosstalk]
JERNIGAN: “Thank you all for the coverage.”
