Bill Brittain
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Bill Brittain (Democratic Party) ran for election to the Pennsylvania State Senate to represent District 43. He lost in the Democratic primary on June 2, 2020.
Brittain completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey in 2020. Click here to read the survey answers.
Biography
Bill Brittain was born in Poland, Ohio, and lives in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. He earned a bachelor's degree from the University of Pittsburgh in 2006. His career experience includes owning the Shadyside Nursery.[1][2]
Elections
2020
See also: Pennsylvania State Senate elections, 2020
General election
General election for Pennsylvania State Senate District 43
Incumbent Jay Costa won election in the general election for Pennsylvania State Senate District 43 on November 3, 2020.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ |  | Jay Costa (D) | 100.0 | 117,888 |
| Total votes: 117,888 | |||
 = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
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Democratic primary election
Democratic primary for Pennsylvania State Senate District 43
Incumbent Jay Costa defeated Bill Brittain in the Democratic primary for Pennsylvania State Senate District 43 on June 2, 2020.
Candidate | % | Votes | ||
| ✔ | | Jay Costa | 76.9 | 42,521 |
 | Bill Brittain | 23.1 | 12,767 | |
| Total votes: 55,288 | |||
| = candidate completed the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection survey. | ||||
| If you are a candidate and would like to tell readers and voters more about why they should vote for you, complete the Ballotpedia Candidate Connection Survey. | ||||
Do you want a spreadsheet of this type of data? Contact our sales team. | ||||
Campaign finance
Campaign themes
2020
Ballotpedia survey responses
See also: Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection
Bill Brittain completed Ballotpedia's Candidate Connection survey in 2020. The survey questions appear in bold and are followed by Brittain's responses. Candidates are asked three required questions for this survey, but they may answer additional optional questions as well.
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My name is Bill Brittain and I am a small business owner (Shadyside Nursery), a 10 year volunteer for Big Brothers and Big Sisters and a member of the PA Farmers Union. I have lived with my wife in Forest Hills for the last 5 years with our dog Atlas.
My work with the PA Farmers Union involved looking into politicians to see how large agriculture conglomerates were influencing state politicians against PA small farms. In my research, I was shocked to see how special interest money floods our political system and who it comes from. See Vote Smart. Amazingly, there are no limits on what can be given to our politicians and this is what causes poor policy and a lack of vision in our government. This is a Republican and Democrat problem, and sadly a state government problem. See Spotlight PA's article on campaign finance.
I felt compelled to stand up as a citizen to this idea of legal corruption and that is why I am running. I believe that the Democratic Party and all government officials should lead by example and not take money from special interests. Our society is facing difficult decisions and we need politicians who can make these decisions without the influence of monied interests attempting to stop real change. We need a systemic change in how our government operates and most importantly, a government that has the interests of the people as their primary goal.
- Money in politics is why we have bad policy
- Living Wage is the most important battle in regards to poverty and education reform
- We need to be realistic and ahead of the curve in regards to addiction and marijuana policy
Campaign finance Reform: getting money out of PA government
Living wage
Marijuana policy to support small farms/small business
Addiction
The environment: ending single use plastic/phasing out fracking
Women's reproductive rights
Making government work for the many not the wealthy
Tenacity, patience and a strong moral compass.
I am incredibly tenacious, patient and open minded. I think these traits would serve me well as an elected official.
I worked as a dishwasher and worked my way up to a line cook at a small Mexican restaurant during high school. It was near my parents house so I would walk to and from work. They were like family to me and I worked there for over 4 years.
Barbarossa. I am a big fan of history and enjoy reading about WW2 on the eastern front. I like reading historical novels to think about what it was like to be involved and live through some of these epic struggles in human history. I think understanding and conceptualizing these events are very important to understanding our modern world.
No, I believe that those from inside the system have proven they cannot change the system. We need more leaders who come forward to fight the injustices in our society because they feel obligated to do so. We do not need more career politicians concerned about staying in power and pleasing their political allies.
Career politicians have been behind the curve for over 40 years and have failed us over and over again. Politicians need to push ideas that will move us forward and at the same time make sure that bills are written and passed with their intended meaning. Too many times, laws are passed with loopholes that are exploited and ultimately defeat the purpose of the bill itself. This needs to stop.
We need to find leaders on all levels of government who want what is moral and right, not what continues their careers.
The greatest challenge in our society over the next 10 years is income inequality. We need to address the divide between the haves and have nots before it is too late. Housing prices continue to skyrocket, wages stay the same and inflation effects every aspect of our lives, how can we continue on this road ?
America creates amazing opportunities to succeed and I am very proud of that but our country ranks 27th in social mobility according to visual capitalist.
This is because we refuse to address some systemic problems in our society. The wealthy have a stranglehold on our political system, wages are too low and massive multinational monopolies dominate our economy. Not to mention the effects of mass incarceration on the poor, a failed drug war and massive discrepancies in education funding in PA.
We can be better but it will require a lot of changes and some discomfort on the realities of our state. I welcome this conversation and hope that we as a state can move this idea to the forefront
Yes. It is beneficial for any relationship for two people to see each other as humans, with all of our faults. I believe that the difference in someone being openminded to a new idea is seeing each other as people.
Note: Ballotpedia reserves the right to edit Candidate Connection survey responses. Any edits made by Ballotpedia will be clearly marked with [brackets] for the public. If the candidate disagrees with an edit, he or she may request the full removal of the survey response from Ballotpedia.org. Ballotpedia does not edit or correct typographical errors unless the candidate's campaign requests it.
See also
2020 Elections
External links
Footnotes
