May 31—GRAND FORKS — Looking back on the last five months of his campaign for North Dakota’s U.S. House seat, Trygve Hammer says he couldn’t have hoped for it to go any better.

“Everywhere we go in North Dakota, we’ve had bigger and bigger crowds each time,” said Hammer, one of two Democratic candidates vying for the position.

If he receives the nomination in the primary over Roland Riemers, he will face whichever

Republican wins the party’s five-way primary.

But since January, when

Hammer declared,

he’s had a second goal beyond getting the nomination: he wants to build back North Dakota’s Democratic-NPL Party.

“We’ve really gotten people to come out of hiding, and now they’re asking for yard signs where they wouldn’t even put them up before, even when they said they’d vote for us,” he said. “I think we’re really making a change. I hope it wins us some this cycle. If not, I’m optimistic about cycles down the road.”

Throughout his campaign, voters he’s talked to have compared him to the Republican candidates, he said. For instance, some have said they’d like to see Hammer — a pro-choice candidate — debate

Republican Cara Mund,

who is also pro-choice.

But Hammer urged people to vote in the Democratic primary, and not cross over to vote in the Republican primary.

“If we have a low showing because a lot of people popped over (to vote on) the Republican side, that has a reverse bandwagon effect in the fall,” he said. “There are a lot of people who might identify as Democrats who would go out and vote if they saw some enthusiasm, but if they see a primary where we have barely any participation and everything’s happening on the Republican side, (they might say), ‘Why bother going out in the fall?’ “

Hammer said many Republicans have told him they would vote for him depending on which candidate wins the primary. He said they tell him that because they’re tired of the party’s antics.

“I’ve had Republicans tell me that, ‘Hey, if

Rick Becker wins,

I’m voting for you,’ and I’ve had Republicans say, ‘If Cara Mund wins, I’m voting for you,’ ” Hammer said. “(Republicans) are not a monolith … as much as (people) might try to paint them that way.”

Compared to the other candidates, Hammer argued that he’s more in touch with the average North Dakotan than anyone else in the competition.

“The Republicans in their debates have talked about experience, but I have a lived experience that is more like that of most North Dakotans than anybody else in this race,” he said. “Working out on the oil rigs, teaching in a high school classroom at a rural school, being a conductor on the railroad, being a counselor over here at (Quentin N.) Burdick Job Corps — I have been among and been one of those people who don’t have a lot of money.”

While he highlighted the border and national debt as two issues he hopes to address, he says based on conversations he’s had with voters, even more pressing to North Dakotans is being able to afford to live and access health care.

“I would like to get comprehensive immigration reform, and I do think we need to tackle the debt and reduce the budget deficit, but what people are really talking about is their own debt, the fees that they don’t see coming every time they purchase something or read something,” Hammer said. “They’re worried about their parents who have never gotten nursing home insurance, and because many of them have shut down, (they’ll have to go) to a facility far from where their family actually lives.”