Democracy Now! broadcasts an exclusive report from just outside a Bain Capital-owned plant in Freeport, Illinois, where workers at Sensata Technologies have set up an encampment called "Bainport" across the street to protest the company's plan to close the plant and move it to China, taking 170 jobs with it.
The workers are campaigning for Mitt Romney, Bain co-founder, to save their jobs. Democracy Now! host Amy Goodman interviews two Sensata workers, Mark Schreck and Tom Gaulrapp, about their tenure at the company and why they area appealing to Romney.
Freeport Mayor George Gaulrapp, who has supported the encampment and fended off calls for it to be shut down, says Romney should get directly involved in the issue. He says he has invited both President Obama and Romney to come to Freeport for a presidential debate, the location of a famous debate between Abraham Lincoln, the Republican candidate for U.S. Senate, and the incumbent Democratic Senator Stephen Douglas on August 27, 1858.
Democracy Now! first spoke to the Sensata workers at the Republican National Convention in Tampa, Florida, where they unsuccessfully tried to meet with Romney. Now, they have returned to Freeport and set up a protest camp in a bid to save their jobs.
Goodman spent the evening at "Bainport" camp talking with two longtime female Sensata workers, Dot Turner and Cheryl Randecker.
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