“Courage Is Contagious”: Rep. Justin Jones and Rep. Zooey Zephyr on the People’s Fight Back Against Bigots, Racists and Fascists

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REP. JUSTIN JONES: “…And so, we are, again, once again, fighting together, united in the struggle against those who would try and scapegoat members of our community, against those who would try and use members of our community as punching bags to distract from their failures, from the — you know, to distract from their failures at the fact that in states like ours, you know, one in five children live in poverty. The majority of people are struggling to get by, because they’re waging a culture war instead of waging a war on poverty, instead of waging a war to protect our communities from this wave of environmental injustice that is plaguing our communities and of corporate attacks that are really denigrating our people, who have to struggle between getting groceries or paying for their prescriptions. I mean, this is what we’re dealing with, is really an attempt to divide and conquer. And we will not bow — we will not cooperate with that. We will not accept that, because we know that — what are the real issues in our community. And that’s not — an issue that they’re making, manufacturing, to distract from their failures, is not the issues that we should be focused on…”
REP. ZOOEY ZEPHYR: “…But I think, you know, what people keep saying is courage is contagious. When you watch people stand up for what is right, to defend their community, when marginalized groups come together and say, as Representative Jones has said, an attack on one of us is an attack on all of us, when you see people stand up, it drives you to stand up similarly. And that’s also why one of the first groups to come out in support of me was Montana’s American Indian Caucus, who said, “This is an inappropriate, undemocratic attack on Representative Zephyr.” And they know that firsthand, because they’ve experienced that. And the attacks on the Native American community in our state and across our country goes way back before the attacks on trans people that we’re seeing today…”

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