Troy Jackson accepted the Democratic nomination for U.S. Senate in Maine after Graham Platner backed out in the face of repeated scandals. Jackson called for party unity and framed the race against Republican incumbent Sen. Susan Collins as a working-class movement.

“From now on this is a general election campaign,” he said. “Today we begin the work of defeating Susan Collins in November.”

“Thirty years later, Susan Collins is still in Washington. So I do have one question: Who has she served?” Jackson said. “For 30 years, she’s told us that she’s concerned. But concern is not courage.”

“What she says in Maine does not erase what she does down in Washington,” Jackson continued. “This election is not going to be decided by corporate PACs, Big Pharma, insurance companies or the billionaires funding Susan Collins. It will be decided in union halls and at kitchen tables.”

“This movement is not from the left. It is not from the right. It’s from the bottom, and we are rising.”