Here’s the latest news today out of Nevada:
With just over a year to go before the 2022 midterm elections, Democrats at the top of the ticket hold narrow leads over their likely GOP opponents, according to a new poll released Sunday by The Nevada Independent.
Gov. Steve Sisolak holds leads well within the margin of error over the two likely GOP frontrunners — leading former U.S. Sen. Dean Heller by 2 points (45.8 percent to 43.3 percent) and in an effective tie with Clark County Sheriff Joe Lombardo (44.9 percent to 44.4 percent). A majority of poll respondents rated Sisolak’s overall job performance and response to the COVID-19 pandemic negatively or as “only fair.”
Despite maintaining a more favorable rating compared to Sisolak, U.S. Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto only carries a 4 point lead (45.5 percent to 41.2 percent) over her likely Republican opponent, former Attorney General Adam Laxalt, among likely voters polled.
The results are a worrisome sign for Nevada Democrats — who have won the vast majority of top-line races in the state since the 2016 election cycle — while also reinforcing Nevada’s status as a true swing state.
During a discussion on the poll held Sunday, pollster Mark Mellman described the effects of COVID-19 as contributing to a hostile election environment for incumbents. But he said that could change depending on what direction COVID and the economy take in the coming year and what policies are passed in the nation’s capital.
“Each race has its own individual dynamics, individual candidates, individual faux paus people make,” Mellman said. “But what we see so far, as we said at the outset, are a set of what are likely to be very close, very competitive, very tough races.”
The poll, conducted by The Mellman Group for The Nevada Independent, sampled 600 likely Nevada voters between Sept. 15 and Sept. 22 over landline, cellphone and text — with 30 percent of respondents registered as Republican, 35 percent registered as Democrat and 35 percent registered as nonpartisan or with another party, percentages closely mirroring the state’s party voter registration. The poll has a 4 percent margin of error.
Along with the statewide likely voters poll, The Mellman Group also conducted two additional polls with one focused on likely Republican voters and the other on non-major party voters. For the first time in state history, non-major party voters make up a plurality of registered voters, creating a new political landscape ahead of the 2022 election.
The non-major party poll had a sample size of 400 likely voters within the same timeframe and using the same methodology. Results from that poll have non-major party voters placing Sisolak even with Heller (42.3 percent to 42.1 percent) but 5 points behind Lombardo (39.6 percent to 44.7 percent). Among non-major party voters, Cortez Masto held a 3.5 percentage point lead over Laxalt (41.7 percent to 39.2 percent), with 14.1 percent of non-major party voters still undecided. That poll had a 4.9 percent margin of error.
Polling of 400 likely voters registered as Republicans saw Heller leading the race for the GOP nomination for governor, as more than 31 percent of respondents expressed support for the former senator. Lombardo followed Heller with 23.2 percent, but a larger group of respondents (27.2 percent) indicated they were still undecided about who they would be voting for in the June 2022 primary.
The statewide poll of all likely voters also found that 60.4 percent of respondents support keeping abortions legal and a similar percentage (60.1 percent) support mask guidance given by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention — two issues Republican candidates are pushing against.
FYI, Trumpism is back on the ballot:
Not long ago, Dean Heller was one of the few Republicans in the Senate willing to challenge then-President Donald Trump. Now, looking to make a political comeback with a run for governor of Nevada, Heller is refusing to say that Trump lost the 2020 election.
“I still know who the president is, but I do believe we have a problem with elections,” Heller said in an interview with the Las Vegas Review-Journal, repeatedly refusing to say that President Joe Biden had won, according to the newspaper owned by the estate of Sheldon Adelson, the late casino mogul and Trump donor.
During his campaign kickoff Monday, Heller said he thought he was done with politics after losing his Senate re-election bid in 2018 to Democratic Sen. Jacky Rosen. But he said he decided to get back in the ring after 2020 because of Covid-19 restrictions, racial unrest and election integrity concerns, among other issues, echoing Trump's sour grapes about the election.
“After the 2016 election, most Democrats thought Hillary Clinton beat President Trump, and after 2020 election, most Republicans believed Trump had won,” Heller said in his announcement speech. "When I’m governor, you’re not going to wonder if elections are fair. You’re going to know elections are fair.”
Also:
Prosecutors plan to call former Nevada Attorney General Adam Laxalt — the frontrunner for the GOP nomination in a crucial 2022 Senate race — to testify in the upcoming criminal trial of Lev Parnas, an associate of Rudy Giuliani who became a central figure in the 2019 impeachment of President Donald Trump.
Laxalt’s unsuccessful 2018 campaign for governor was among the recipients of two $5,000 donations from another Giuliani associate, Igor Fruman, that the Justice Department alleges were straw contributions from a Russian businessman not permitted to fund U.S. campaigns. And prosecutors say Laxalt’s testimony will show he was deceived into believing the donation was legitimate.
Fruman, a co-defendant in the case, pleaded guilty earlier this month and is cooperating with prosecutors. Giuliani has not been charged, but his Manhattan apartment and office were raided by the FBI in May in a foreign influence investigation with links to the ongoing prosecution. The former New York City mayor and prominent attorney for Trump has denied wrongdoing.
The Justice Department also indicated that Parnas’ attorneys could make life very uncomfortable for Laxalt at the trial for Parnas and another co-defendant set to open Oct. 12 in Manhattan federal court.
“Parnas has informed the Government that he may wish to cross-examine Laxalt on political positions that Laxalt has publicly adopted, in order to suggest that Laxalt could not honestly believe those positions and thus is not credible,” prosecutors wrote. “Such questioning would confuse the issues, distract the jury, and be unnecessarily inflammatory. ... Given the fraught nature of modern politics, it can reasonably be expected that some jurors will strongly disagree with Laxalt’s political positions, and come to doubt his testimony for reasons entirely unrelated to its truth.”
Democracy and Health are on the ballot and we need to get ready to keep Nevada Blue. Click below to donate and get involved with Sisolak, Cortez Masto and their fellow Nevada Democrats campaigns:
Governor Steve Sisolak (D. NV)
U.S. Senator Catherine Cortez Masto (D. NV)
Aaron Ford (D. NV) for Attorney General
Dina Titus (D. NV) for Congress