Nevada’s Little Caucus That Shouldn’t

(Chuck Muth) – The Nevada Republican Party’s decision to hold a competing presidential caucus two days after the legislatively mandated presidential primary next February seems to be as popular among Republicans as wearing COVID face diapers.

And the party’s reasoning for excluding the vast majority of Republican voters from participating in the nomination process – only the winner of the caucus, not the primary, will receive delegates to the national convention – just doesn’t hold water.

Think about this: What were the GOP’s major failures at the ballot box last year?

To start, Republicans lost a U.S. Senate seat by fewer than 8,000 votes while 175,000 active registered Republicans stayed home and didn’t vote.

Clearly, getting out the vote (GOTV) was a MAJOR failure of the party – and it clearly dropped the ball and lost the “ballot harvesting” and “early voting” games with the Democrats.

And there are still some out there quacking about “voter fraud” even though the party has never been able to actually prove and back up its allegations.

So if party leaders were smart (insert sarcasm here) they’d embrace the February 6 GOP primary – on Reagan’s birthday! – and use it as an opportunity to test out new get-out-the-vote, ballot-harvesting, and early voting programs (if they have any), as well as give any new election integrity measures a test run.

Think of it as a pre-season game.

Then they can take what they learned in February, make changes as needed, and give their programs another test run in the June primary for every office other than president.

Then take what they learned in June and be ready to go toe-to-toe, ballot-by-ballot in the critical general election in November.

And while I know most people are mostly focused on the race for the White House right now, here in Nevada we have a much more important problem to deal with.

Democrats control the Nevada State Assembly with a super-majority and are only one seat away from controlling the Nevada State Senate with a super-majority – and three GOP Senate seats are in serious jeopardy.

And if Nevada Republicans fail to pick up a seat in the Assembly and lose a seat in the Senate, Republican Gov. Joe Lombardo will be a sitting duck.

Democrats will have the 2/3 votes needed to override most of his 75 vetoes this session and will have the votes to pass massive new tax hikes the governor will be helpless to block.

I realize the Trump campaign and the Nevada GOP are joined at the hip. But we have big trouble right here in River City. Our governor and legislators need the party’s help far more than Trump does.

So holding two pre-season primary games in February and June to get ready for the November general election Super Bowl – where just a handful of votes can be the difference between winning and losing – would be a much smarter strategy than trying to stack the sparsely-attended presidential caucus in Trump’s favor.

For those who have asked, here’s what can be done about it…

I’m told the Nevada Republican Central Committee will be meeting in late September in Winnemucca (making it as inconvenient as possible for southern Nevada Republicans to participate, of course).

And I gotta believe the Central Committee members can over-rule the party’s leaders and scrap the caucus – IF there are enough sane, common-sense members on the committee.

We’re doomed.

Politics on the Rocks Tonight: It’s On!

Tonight’s Politics on the Rocks happy hour with Gov. Joe Lombardo and Congressman Mark Amodei is on.  “Hurricane Hilary” gave it her best shot, but the show will go on.

A couple of quick updates…

1.)  The event has been sold out for weeks, so unfortunately those on the wait list won’t be able to get tickets and no tickets will be sold at the door.

2.)  There’s still a chance that “Hilary” will rain on our parade.  However, there’s a covered parking garage adjacent to Vic’s Las Vegas restaurant so you won’t have to walk in the rain if she does.

Parking in the garage is just $2/hour…and if you get your parking ticket validated at the hostess stand, you’ll even get a discount off of that.

3.)  When it comes to food, attendees can pay-as-you go if you want to grab a bite.  Vic’s has put together a special food-and-drink menu for us (see below) or you can order anything off the regular menu.

4.)  Doors open at 6:00 pm for mixing and mingling and taking selfies.  We plan to have the governor and congressman say a few words around 6:30 or 6:45 pm from the stage.

5.)  That is, of course, provided “Hilary” doesn’t interfere with their schedule.

Congressman Amodei is flying down from Reno this morning…and I think we all know the state of air travel – even on a good day – under the Biden administration.

And if there are serious emergency matters the governor has to deal with, that could throw a monkey wrench in his plans. So…fingers crossed.

Again, this is the first time we’ve hosted an event quite like this at such a swanky, new restaurant.  And anything that can go wrong, might.  We’ll just roll with the punches.

But owner Sue Lowden and her team have bent over backwards to make this happen and I think you’re in for a whale of a good time.  There’s even going to be a pair of $100 gift certificates to Vic’s as door prizes.

And maybe even a very special signing ceremony you won’t want to miss.

See ya tonight.  Cheers!

FAMOUS LAST WORDS

“Jon Ralston is known for stirring the pot, so to speak, and he is quite frequently wrong. He has no clue…” – Democrat Nevada Attorney General A.Ron Ford, Nevada Week, 8/2/23

“I don’t understand much about politics…” – Liberal blubber-blogger Jon Ralston, 1/2/20

Mr. Muth is president of Citizen Outreach, publisher of Nevada News & Views, and founder of CampaignDoctor.com.  You can sign up for his conservative, Nevada-focused e-newsletter at MuthsTruths.com.  His views are his own.