USW Honors Casey, Brown with Conway Awards 

His voice cracking with emotion, International President David McCall on Wednesday presented the first Thomas M. Conway Lifetime Achievement Award to former U.S. Sen. Bob Casey of Pennsylvania.

As Casey took the stage, a spotlight fell on an American flag behind the rostrum – one of the flags presented to Conway’s family by the honor guard detail at the memorial service that followed the late USW international president’s passing in 2023. 

“I want to thank the Conway family,” Casey said, “for giving us Tom Conway.” 

Casey shared the inaugural award with his fellow former U.S. senator, Sherrod Brown of Ohio, who, like Casey, joined the Senate in 2007 and served until January 2025.  

Friends and colleagues for 18 years, the pair fought tirelessly for the most important issues facing USW members, including workers’ rights, affordable health care, fair trade, workplace safety and retirement security. 

The USW International Executive Board voted to establish a tradition of presenting the Conway award to champions of labor at each USW convention. 

Brown, in a video address, thanked USW members for their commitment to workers’ rights, calling attention to the small canary pin he has worn on his lapel each day for 25 years, a symbol of what once was one of the few pieces of safety equipment provided to mine workers. 

“It symbolizes all that this union does, fighting for justice,” Brown said. 

Brown is continuing that fight, he said, with the establishment of the national Dignity of Work Institute, a nonprofit organization dedicated to making sure the economy prioritizes workers. 

In a personal address, Casey reminded delegates that his father, when he was Pennsylvania governor in 1992, dedicated a statue called “The Pennsylvania Worker,” that for 18 years stood outside the governor’s residence in Harrisburg. 

The statue was meant to celebrate the workers who built the nation and who fought to make sure that the jobs they did came with good pay and benefits as well as dignity and justice. 

“None of those things could have happened,” Casey said, “without the men and women of steel.”