Troy Friday captures his image in the reflection of a truck stop grill door where he posted a flier for his local’s health care reform efforts.

UAW Local 5286 member Troy Friday is a 17-year veteran of Freightliner LLC in Gastonia, N.C., where they make truck parts. A local union activist, the 43-year-old Friday also is education chair.

With more than 47 million Americans without health care coverage, what do you think about the reform debate in Congress?

I have complete confidence in President Barack Obama and what he’s trying to get done for people without health care. I recall a couple of months ago, some dentists in Chicago offered free dental work for two days to anyone who did not have insurance. They were inundated with people from several states. It’s so obvious how many people in this country cannot afford health care, and this is the richest nation in the world. On the last day, one of doctors said he was saddened by how many people they had to turn away.

You work at Freightliner’s parts facility. The company used to ship parts to your sister plant in Mount Holly, N.C., but now their work is shipped to Mexico. Where are the parts you make going?

Our parts facility in Gastonia is building parts for that plant in Mexico, and that makes me sick. During our last negotiations, the company CEO said he was only building the facility in Mexico to take the overflow work from the Mt. Holly plant. … Now, they’re moving all that work to Mexico. If they can do that to the Mount Holly workers, then who’s next – us? We want the people to know if we go down, we will go down swinging.