Some Post-Primary Observations

(Chuck Muth) – Now that the primary is behind us, we can get back to something REALLY important: the Stanley Cup.  But before plopping down in front of the boob tube to keep an eye on the penalty box, let’s take a look at what happened yesterday at the ballot box…

As expected, Joe Lombardo is the GOP nominee for Nevada governor.  And as painful as the reality is for some people, you either vote for him in November or you hand Gov. Steve Sisolak another four years to finish his demolition of our state.

Dust yourself off, lick your wounds, bitch and moan as much as you want…but when the general election rolls around, suck it up and VOTE SISOLAK OUT!

And kudos to Joey Gilbert.

The campaign he put together with some duct tape and spare parts was truly impressive.  No candidate anywhere in the state had such rabid, passionate supporters.  But in such a large multi-candidate field – in which only Michele Fiore was selfless enough to drop out and run for a different seat – the writing was pretty much on the wall.

Joey, if he wants it, can have a VERY bright political future.  If Lombardo beats Sisolak, maybe we can get him appointed to the Boxing Commission!

Speaking of Fiore, she crushed Manny Kess – who for some reason thought dressing up in drag and producing a god-awful video trying to ridicule Fiore was a brilliant move.  And his sour grapes tweet last night calling Fiore “disgusting” was stupid on steroids.

Unlike Gilbert, Manny’s political future in Nevada is probably over.

Understandably, my favorite result last night was Sigal Chattah (disclaimer: a client) blowing Tisha Black out of the water.  I mean, it wasn’t even close – 51% to 39%.  And as Megan Barth of the Nevada Globe (you should be reading the Globe every day!) reported, Chattah won 15 out of 17 counties, losing only barely in Eureka and Mineral counties.

Tisha NEVER should have gotten into this race. She was talked into it by the GOP Establishment in the Carson City swamp, which bet on Black and ended up crapping out.

All Tisha did was drain Chattah’s bank account of money that could have been used to defeat soft-on-crime Democrat Attorney General Aaron Ford in the general. She also did significant damage to her cousin, Annie Black (disclaimer: a client), in Annie’s race for Congress.

Tisha’s the one who donated all that money to Democrats over the years – including Harry Reid and Sisolak – not Annie.  But I saw a lot of traffic on social media and emails in which voters got the two confused and said they wouldn’t vote for Annie because they thought SHE was the one who made those donations.

Annie ran a helluva campaign and has an army of loyal, passionate supporters within her Assembly district. But the congressional district was much larger and lot of voters simply didn’t know her, while Sam Peters had been running for the seat for almost four years.

In hindsight, things might have been different had Annie gotten into the race months sooner.  But the fact that the Democrats didn’t redraw the district lines until last November was a big problem.  She didn’t know if she’d be drawn into the 4^th Congressional District or not.

While the loss is certainly a bitter pill to swallow, Annie went out with class.  She’s already endorsed Peters and already wrote a check to his campaign…just as she said she would do on Monday if things didn’t go her way.

You haven’t heard the last of Annie Black.

Not surprisingly, Adam Laxalt won the primary for Nevada’s U.S. Senate seat.  He had it ALL…name ID, a record in office, an experienced campaign team, a boatload of money – including over a million dollars in third-party/PAC independent expenditures – plus the endorsements of Donald Trump and other DC elected officials.

Under the circumstances, his opponent, Sam Brown, did a heckuva lot better than he should have or anyone expected.  The simple fact is, Goliath beats David more often than the other way around.

Sam’s a class act and true American hero.  You haven’t heard the last of him either. And while I certainly have strong reservations about Adam, I’ll take him any day ending in “y” over Democrat incumbent Sen. Catherine Cortez-Biden.

In Nevada’s 3^rd Congressional District, April Becker crushed it with over 65% of the vote despite a pair of candidates who jumped into the race for no reason other than to fatten the wallets of some political consultants.

In fact, one of the consultants actually threatened April that they would put a candidate in the race against her if she didn’t hire them.  She didn’t.  They did.  And April mopped the floor with them.

April is, without a doubt, the GOP candidate with the absolute best chance to oust a sitting Democrat congress-critter in the general election.  Her general election opponent, Susie Lee-Biden, is perhaps the most uninspiring and unaccomplished Democrat on the ballot…unless you consider $5/gallon for gas, empty store shelves, a neighborhood crime wave and a wide-open border “accomplishments.”

Lee-Biden is going down in November.  You heard it here first.

In Nevada’s 2^nd Congressional District, Rep. Mark Amodei handily turned back a late challenge by Danny Tarkanian.

While Tark had a legitimate beef that Amodei’s voting record wasn’t as conservative as it could be considering this is a safe GOP district, the fact is Amodei has been representing the district for a long time while Tark only moved to northern Nevada a couple years ago.

Having lived in Carson City for a few years, I can guarantee you a lot of northern Nevadans want nothing to do with anyone from southern Nevada.

In addition, Amodei is positioned for some plum committee assignments, based on his seniority, should Republicans not blow the opportunity to win back control of the House in November. And, well, people just like him. And voters tend to vote for people they like.

In the multi-candidate primary field for the 1^st Congressional District, Mark Robertson came out on top.  Good guy and solid base among the LDS community.  But beating Titus in this Democrat-majority district is gonna be real tough – especially after she blew her own primary opponent out of the water.

Couple more…

Stavros Anthony bested Tony Grady in the lieutenant governor’s race.  I really like Tony, but I like Stavros as well.  I could certainly live with either.  And believe Stavros has a great chance to win this seat in the general.

Jim Marchant came out on top in a crowded race for Secretary of State.  Not a surprise.  He latched onto the “election fraud” issue and ran that horse to the finish line in a GOP primary where that issue was on the minds of a lot Republican voters.  But I worry about his ability to translate that into a general election win.

Andy Matthews didn’t have a primary opponent in the race for state Controller and will face former Democrat Assemblywoman Ellen Spiegel in the general.  His chances look good, but not a slam dunk.

A lot of local and legislative races are still too close to call, so I’ll wait ‘til later once more results are finalized to assess what went down.  But I’ll leave with this one…

Drew Johnson, a rock-solid conservative if there ever was one, blew out the GOP primary competition in the Clark County Commission District F race despite some gutter politics leveled against him.  He’ll now go on to face off with one of the most anti-gun Democrats in the state, Justin Jones.

Drew is probably the only Republican with a legitimate chance to pick up a seat on the all-Democrat commission this year – though Marco Hernandez’ “independent” challenge to incumbent Tick Segerblom in November could be interesting.

But that’ll depend, in large part, on whether or not Republicans are smart enough to recognize their nominee has absolutely no chance to win this seat and instead rally behind Marco who only barely lost to Tick four years ago.

If Republicans want to oust the father of Harry Reid International Airport, this is the ONLY way.  But it will depend on Republicans blowing an opportunity to blow an opportunity.

Uh-oh.

FAMOUS LAST WORDS

“Wondering why @DemGovs would spend $3m in the GOP primary to try and take out @JoeLombardoNV?  First poll of general election: Lombardo is leading @SteveSisolak for Gov & @JoeBiden remains under water in Nevada.” – Dave Rexrode

“Congratulations @VoteAprilBecker on your primary victory! April is a strong Conservative ready to deliver results for the people of NV-03! Let’s flip the seat and fire Pelosi!” – Rep. Steve Scalise

“@VoteAprilBecker is a rockstar and I can’t want to see her win in November.” – Nikki Haley

“Susie (Lee) thinks we’re all stupid. She copies and pastes from the DCCC (Democrat Congressional Campaign Committee) and votes with Biden 100% of the time. Susie helped cause record gas prices and soaring inflation and then has the gall to say she won’t apologize for it.  Sending you into retirement is going to be fun.” – April Becker

“Dr. Anthony Fauci has tested positive for Covid-19, the NIH confirms. It’s the first time since the pandemic began. NIH says he has mild symptoms and has been boosted twice.” – Kaitlan Collins

“One more booster ought to do the trick.” – Greg Price

“Miss Universe is claiming that ‘not all people who menstruate are women,’ and shared ‘inclusive language’ guidelines to its Twitter account on Tuesday, instructing the public to say ‘people’ have periods, not ‘women.’” – Breitbart News

Mr. Muth is president of Citizen Outreach, publisher of Nevada News & Views and blogs at MuthsTruths.com