Mues stumps in Havre for U.S. Senate

Democratic U.S. Senate candidate John Mues of Loma was in Havre Thursday at Triple Dog Brewing Co. to speak about his campaign.

"We need to get away from career politicians, we need a better circulation of new blood and new ideas in our political process," Mues said. "Today, being a career politician is a liability, not an asset. Why do we have all these big problems? Someone should be held accountable."

At this point in the campaign, Mues faces Helena Mayor Wilmot Collins, Cora Neumann of Bozeman and Michael Knoles of Bozeman in the Democratic primary.

The winner of that race will face Sen. Steve Daines, R-Mont., in the general election.

Daines has no Republican challenger at this point.

Mues grew up, in part, on the Hi-Line, living in Wolf Point and Deer Lodge as a child. He also lived for a period of time in Helena, before enlisting in the U.S. Navy. He served in numerous missions during the Iraq War while in the Navy. After leaving the military, he became a teacher at Hays-Lodge Pole High School as part of the Troops to Teachers program before becoming a senior engineer, working on a number of renewable energy projects.

He said that he has a broad and deep set of skills and experiences in leadership roles from his career paths. He added that the reason he decided to run for office is because he feels empathy for all Montanans, and empathy is the most important trait of any elected official, caring about the success, health and prosperity of all people, regardless of background.

"I think people are worried about the country I think people are worried about the state," he said. "I think people intuitively feel a sense of real crisis."

Since he started his campaign July, Mues said, he has heard from a large number of people from the communities where he has visited, including Havre Thursday, that one of the largest issues the country is facing is the trade war, which is impacting farmers and agricultural communities across the country.

Others include the lack of livable wage jobs available, the lack of affordable quality health care and climate change.

"First of all we need a U.S. senator who fulfills the role that our countries founders envisioned, and that is as a check and balance to the executive branch rather than being a 'yes man' and a rubber stamp," he said.

Darwin Zellmer, a rural mail carrier for the U.S. Postal Service in Harlem, said that after speaking with Mues, he has decided to support his campaign. 

"I was here to check him out, but when he said his dad was a rural mail carrier, I knew he was abreast of a lot of issues in the Postal Service, or should be, and I felt that I'm going to support him no matter what," Zellmer said.

Mues said that the trade war is a big issue which Congress needs to address, but the federal government also needs to address another crisis.

"We are facing unprecedented economic inequality in the country," he said. "We have never seen these levels of income inequality and we haven't seen these levels of wealth inequality since the Great Depression."

Many people across the country have to work multiple jobs to put food on the table and people are seeing fewer and fewer benefits associated with their jobs, Mues said. The country is trillions of dollars in debt and the country has very little set in place to protect people from a future economic recession.

"We need a state and a country where systems work for everybody, not just the privileged few and that can be applied to any area," he said.