As former NFL head coach Bill Parcells once said, “You are what your record says you are.”

Preston Nouri agrees and wants to see Rep. Mike Kelly (R-16) stand by his record.

The Erie Times-News reported that Kelly’s family-owned car dealership – the Mike Kelly Automotive Group – received a $314,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture to install solar panels at a dealership in Uniontown – in the home district of Rep. Guy Reschenthaler (R-14).

At issue? Kelly vehemently opposed the legislation.

Nouri, the Democratic nominee for the seat held by Kelly, is urging the seven-term congressman to return the grant and accused him of having “a record of personally profiting from taxpayer dollars.”

“Mike Kelly shows his true colors once again,” Nouri said in a statement. “For over 13 years, he keeps getting caught with his hand in the cookie jar, taking taxpayer money to enrich himself while working against the interests of the people he’s supposed to represent.”

In 2018, The Rural Energy for America Program was authorized under the farm bill and reauthorized in 2022 as part of President Joe Biden’s $740 Inflation Reduction Act.

When the farm bill was adopted, Kelly celebrated and said, “These are not red or blue issues — they’re red, white, and blue issues.”

Four years later, his tone had changed.

“This bill is loaded with bad policy and wasteful spending that will ultimately worsen inflation, expand government, and hurt the middle-class. Perhaps worst of all: the Democrats are weaponizing the IRS to shakedown hardworking Americans to pay for a bill passed under one-party rule.”

The grant allows the dealership to install a 261.9-kilowatt solar photovoltaic system, which is projected to save the family-owned business an estimated $27,300 per year.

Nouri says Kelly should return the grant money to the federal government immediately.

“If he truly cares about taxpayers and saving money for our nation, the first thing he should do is to pay back the federal government the $315,000 immediately,” Nouri said.

According to the Times-News, it’s not the first time the car dealership has been the recipient of a taxpayer-funded federal program. During the COVID-19 pandemic, the group of car dealerships that was first created in 1953 applied for and received a nearly $1 million forgivable loan from the Paycheck Protection Program (PPP).

He later had that loan forgiven.

Kelly’s campaign has not made a comment on the situation.