When it comes to the largest systems, one of the jokes you often hear is that the contractors will have employees in practically every state of the union. In fact, one of the displays that the U.S. Congress asks for is a display from contractors, showing where the employment is. In the case of bigger programs, maybe Montana doesn't have very many employees, but most of the rest of the states might well have many, maybe thousands of employees involved.
That means there is a political interest in these programs once they have such a large footprint.