Internet sensation the 'Green Shirt Guy' joins congressional candidate Eva Putzova's team

Alex Kack, who last year briefly became an internet sensation known as the "Green Shirt Guy," is now working for a liberal congressional candidate challenging incumbent Rep. Tom O'Halleran in Arizona's 1st Congressional District.

Kack trended on social media in August after a camera caught him laughing — hard — at a MAGA-hat-wearing woman who was protesting sanctuary cities at a Tucson City Council meeting. Kack was wearing a green golf shirt and #GreenShirtGuy emerged as a viral Twitter hashtag.

Earlier this month, Democratic congressional candidate Eva Putzova announced Kack as her campaign's new field manager. Putzova is mounting a primary campaign against O'Halleran, D-Ariz., from the left.

On Thursday, Kack announced on Twitter that "I got a new shirt!" A video shows him taking off a green shirt to reveal a red "Eva Putzova for Congress" T-shirt underneath.

Kack remains the good-humored activist that the Internet made famous, but he says he takes his campaign work seriously and shares Putzova's progressive values.

"'Green Shirt Guy' is still a factor in my life, and, by default, a factor in my work, but the campaign is not about me," Kack told The Arizona Republic. "It's about putting a progressive set of values and policies out there for voters."

Putzova is part of a new wave of liberal candidates challenging centrist Democratic incumbents across the country, much like Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., did in 2018. She shares many of Ocasio-Cortez's priorities, including her Green New Deal strategy to combat climate change.

"I am very much on the same page as AOC. We see structural problems in our system that have been in the making for decades," Putzova said.

Like Ocasio-Cortez, Putzova's grass-roots-style campaign will not accept corporate or special-interest campaign contributions.

Putzova approached Kack about the position because of his experience as a community organizer.

Kack first met Putzova, a former Flagstaff city councilwoman, while he was campaigning for Tucson's Proposition 205, a ballot initiative asking voters to make Tucson a sanctuary city. Voters rejected Prop. 205 in November.

"Alex has the right mix of experience and he can help us with organizing and field programs," Putzova said.

Putzova's campaign

The 1st District, considered politically competitive, covers much of rural northern and northeastern Arizona, including Flagstaff, and stretches south to the outskirts of Tucson. It is the 10th largest congressional district in the nation and is larger than Slovakia, the country where Putzova was born.

O'Halleran is a political moderate who defeated Republican Wendy Rodgers in 2018 with 54% of the vote. President Donald Trump carried the district by 1 percentage point in 2016.

O'Halleran, as of Sept. 30, had raised almost 10 times as much campaign money as Putzova.

Barbara McGuire, a former state lawmaker, also has announced that she is running in the Aug. 4 Democratic primary, but no fundraising numbers have been made public yet. Two other Democratic candidates, Miguel Olivas and Larry Williams, also are running in the district.

Four Republicans are also hoping to challenge O'Halleran in November.

Putzova is using social media, phone banks and text campaigns to reach voters throughout the district.

She also is focusing on door-to-door canvassing.

"One voter told me that I am the second candidate to ever knock on her door. The first was (the late Sen.) John McCain, who, almost 40 years ago, was running for his first House seat," Putzova said.

McCain represented a Phoenix-area congressional district for two terms from 1983 to 1987 before winning a Senate seat in the 1986 election.