LUZERNE COUNTY, Pa. — President Joe Biden arrived at the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton International Airport Wednesday afternoon for his first visit to the area since his election.
Air Force One touched down before 4:30 p.m.
The president was accompanied by U.S. Senator Bob Casey, also a Scranton native.
Biden was greeted on the tarmac by Gov. Tom Wolf, U.S. Representative Matt Cartwright, Scranton Mayor Paige Cognetti, and other officials.
Rep. Cartwright brought two guests with him to the airport to meet the president—a registered nurse from Glenburn Township Jennifer Partyka, and Zubeen Saeed of Wilkes-Barre, the president of Building Blocks Learning Center in Wilkes-Barre.
"It was just amazing, a great experience and just I was in awe, really awesome," Saeed said. "Talking about how it's so critical to invest in education because if we invest in education, it's going to be a rippling effect in our society, a positive effect, so I was just talking about if we put in money to provide free pre-K for children, we can then allow parents to go back to work, and then they have extra money to better their family, and then employers are happy because then you have stable workers, so it's just a rippling positive effect of an ecosphere. So he was like, 'I guess that's what Build Back Better is all about.'"
"I was sharing how proud he is making all of us here in the Scranton area," Partyka said. I'm incredibly proud that he's from this area that he continues to treat us like we're worthwhile. It's very nice of him to do that. I thanked him for his leadership in the pandemic. Being a nurse on the front lines, we are definitely strapped. It has been a very difficult existence. I feel much more hopeful now that he is our president."
The president is speaking at the Electric City Trolley Museum in Scranton to promote his infrastructure plan.