He praised Montana unionists for getting more than 1,000 people to rally at the Capitol during the legislative session against Republican budget cuts and attacks on public employees.

"It was the biggest thing we've seen in Montana in a long while," Trumka said. "That's exactly what we need to do again and again and again, and that's show our colors together, show our strength together, show our determination and show our solidarity. That's how we're going to win, brothers and sisters."

A decade ago, he said, the United States had such a large budget surplus that George W. Bush ran on a platform of giving back rebates and tax cuts.

"Those tax cuts, primarily, almost exclusively, quite frankly, were passed to the rich in 2001 and 2003," he said. "Then we got tied up in two wars that we didn't pay for. We had health care costs that were soaring, and then Wall Street recklessly wrecked our entire economy."

American people paid for it by losing their jobs and having their homes foreclosed, Trumka said.

"Then we paid for it with the taxes that we pay because they bailed out Wall Street with your money, and you do pay taxes, even though corporate America doesn't pay much taxes," he said.