Kiernan Majerus-Collins is an attorney and a former member of the Lewiston School Committee.

Across Maine, working people are being crushed by an economic system rigged against them. Wages are stagnant, housing costs are spiraling out of control and the dream of a secure life is slipping away.

In my own community of Lewiston, several of the poorest census tracts in the entire state can be found downtown, where nearly 100% of residents are renters (myself included), vulnerable to the whims of an unforgiving market. This is not a local anomaly. It is a symptom of a statewide crisis born from decades of policy that has systematically transferred wealth from the hands of the many to the pockets of the few.

In the face of this profound economic failure, leading Republican politicians offer a predictable and poisonous diversion. Instead of confronting the corporate landlords and Wall Street speculators driving this crisis, they tell us to fear our immigrant neighbors. Instead of demanding that billionaires pay their taxes, they tell us to direct our anger at transgender children.

This is the classic right-wing playbook: manufacture a culture war to distract from the class war that the wealthy are winning every single day. It is a cynical strategy designed to make working people fight each other over scraps, while those at the top hoard the entire feast.

The Democratic tradition, at its best, offers a clear and powerful alternative. We reject the politics of scapegoating and instead identify the true source of our problems: an economic order that prioritizes private profit over the public good. The solution is not to find a vulnerable group to blame, but to fundamentally restructure our economy by empowering the working class.

This is not a punishment for success. It is a long-overdue correction to a system that has allowed obscene levels of wealth to accumulate at the top while essential public goods — like housing, health care and education — are starved of resources. It means implementing a truly progressive tax code where corporations and the ultra-rich pay what they owe to the society that makes their success possible.

With that revenue, we can build a Maine that works for everyone. We can treat housing as the human right it is by funding a massive expansion of publicly owned, affordable housing, protecting working families from the whims of the market.

We can fully fund our public schools, from pre-K through university, ensuring that every child’s future is determined by their dreams, not their parents’ income. As a former school committee member and union educator, I have seen firsthand that robust public investment is the most effective engine for opportunity we have.

Building a just economy also requires strengthening the power of labor. It means passing laws that make it easier for workers to form unions and bargain collectively for better wages, benefits and working conditions. For too long, corporate interests have dictated the terms of our economy; it is time for working people to have a seat at the table.

The choice for Maine could not be clearer. We can choose the path of division and austerity, where public services are cut, workers’ rights are eroded, and we are told to blame our neighbors for problems created by corporate leaders.

Or, we can choose the path of solidarity. We can choose to build a society where every person has a right to a safe home, a quality education and a dignified life. We can choose to embrace newcomers and those who are different from us, recognizing that their energy and ambition are an indispensable part of building our state’s future. We can choose to tax the rich, empower workers and invest in a shared future of prosperity for all.

Let’s reject the politics of fear and embrace the politics of solidarity. The fight for a better Maine is the fight for a better world.