STRONG LOCAL ROOTS
Mary Jo grew up in Narberth, the oldest of seven kids. Her father was an electrician and member of IBEW Local 98 and her mother was both community-minded and socially conscious.  One of her earliest memories is joining her mom on a hot summer morning walking a picket line in support of the United Farmworkers.

With that upbringing Mary Jo’s passion for activism was instilled at a very young age.  Growing up at a time when civil rights, the Vietnam War, women’s liberation, and assassinations of President John Kennedy, Martin Luther King and Bobby Kennedy, Mary Jo knows what it is like to live in unsettled times.

EDUCATION
Mary Jo took a non-traditional path to gaining an education.  She has an AS degree from Gwynedd Mercy College.  After graduating Mary Jo worked until the birth of her daughter, but always knew that she would return to school at the right time.  While working full-time to support her daughter, Mary Jo earned a BBA from the Wharton School and a MPA from the Fels Institute of Government at the University of Pennsylvania.

In 1992 Mary was elected to serve on Narberth Borough Council.  For twenty years she served the people of Narberth as a member of the council, 8 years as the “lone” Democrat and 10  years as the Council President.

In 2012, Mary Jo ran for State Representative and won with 59% percent of the vote.  She has been serving as a State Representative for the people of the 148th district since 2013.

EXPERIENCE
As a State Representative she has been a strong progressive voice fighting the right-wing Republicans as they attacked teachers, union workers, pillaged the environment and pulled dirty tricks to keep people from voting—she called them out every time.  She has fought time and again for sustainable funding for public education, environmental safeguards, better health care and vigorously defended women’s rights.  Mary Jo has been working with lawmakers, community organizations and schools to find ways to keep our children safe while they attend school and is committed to finding the right balance in keeping weapons out of the hands of people who shouldn’t have them and addressing how easily available these weapons are to obtain.

Mary Jo is an experienced public servant whose long record of standing up for the right things speaks for itself and she would serve Montgomery County proudly in the halls of Congress.

ELECTING MORE WOMEN
Pennsylvania is second to last, only behind Mississippi, in electing women to public office. So Mary Jo, and her colleague Rep. Tina Davis, banded together to change that.  In 2015 they co-founded Emerge Pennsylvania.  Emerge Pennsylvania is changing the face of PA politics by identifying, training and encouraging Democratic women to run for office, get elected and to seek higher office.  Since its founding, Emerge Pennsylvania has trained dozens of women, where many have gone on to run for office, and 27 have won their elective seat. Women all across the country put their name on the ballot and ran in 2018, making it the year of the woman. Now, in 2020, we need strong female leadership more than ever. 

Mary Jo and her husband, Bob Winkelman, live in Narberth where they enjoy gardening, reading and traveling.  She has a grown daughter, a stepdaughter and a stepson as well as three beautiful grandchildren.