More than 800 people gathered at The Wilma Theater in downtown Missoula Thursday night. It was the second time in the past year that New York Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez spoke to a crowd of Missoulians.
"I'm very aware of the fact that I'm coming here as a New Yorker," Ocasio-Cortez said.
Last spring she took to the stage with Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders on their nationwide Fighting Oligarchy Tour. But this time she opened for Sam Forstag, a former smokejumper and union member, who opened for her at last year’s event.
"Because what the folks and the big money don't want us to realize is that we're actually, in our struggles, are far more common than our landscapes are different." Ocasio-Cortez said.
Forstag is a candidate hoping to secure the Democratic nomination for Montana’s western U.S. House district. He’s running on a platform similar to Ocasio-Cortez’s, championing unions and the working class.
Both he and Ocasio-Cortez referenced Montana’s rising cost of housing, the lack of affordable health care, and lawmakers they say are out of touch.
"In a moment when the average congressperson is worth 15 times the average American, these are experiences that far too few of the people in power know what it is like," Forstag said.
Forstag also called out current Republican Rep. Ryan Zinke for failing to stop drastic cuts to land management agencies as well as mass firings of agency employees under Elon Musk.
And he spoke against the influence of corporate dollars, pointing to the Montana Plan, which would bar companies from contributing to candidate and ballot measure elections.
"All we got to do is reform our tax code to make sure that corporations and the richest people in this country carry their own damn weight, just like the rest of us," Forstag said.
Forstag is in a packed primary facing off against Ryan Busse, Russ Cleveland and Matt Rains.
The primary election is Tuesday, June 2. According to the Secretary of State’s office, more than 500,000 absentee ballots have already been sent to voters.
