* 155,000+ registered Republicans stayed home in a U.S. Senate race that Adam Laxalt lost by fewer than 8,000 votes. But the failure was not just in voter turnout.
* Two weeks before Election Day, Laxalt spent seven days doing a celebrity photo-op bus tour in Nevada’s deep-red rural counties when he should have been camped out in Clark and Washoe counties courting the votes of non-partisan voters.
* Why?
* Because the final voting totals show that over 200,000 non-partisans voted…and clearly the majority of them didn’t vote for Laxalt. If they had, he’d have won just like fellow Republican Joe Lombardo.
* On November 2nd – a week before Election Day – Trump “cling-on” Ric Grenell boasted on Twitter: “We are on a bus tour with @adamlaxalt through Nevada towns that @CortezMasto won’t visit.”
* Of course, she didn’t visit those rural towns because she knew Laxalt already had them locked up. Instead, she campaigned in Clark and Washoe counties where the “undecided” voters were, while Laxalt and Grenell were out preaching to the choir.
* Pretty obvious which strategy was the winning strategy.
* And then there was the messaging. From his luxury bus on November 2, Laxalt tweeted…
“Concert tickets, designer handbags, fancy plane flights - @CortezMasto took gifts from donors to benefit herself. Her net worth increased by millions of dollars while she’s been in office. It
doesn't add up.”
* Does anyone seriously believe those “inside baseball” issues were on the minds of non-partisan voters as they were filling out their ballots?
* Three days before Election Day, Laxalt tweeted out two polls supposedly showing him up on Cortez Masto by 6 points. And boasted: “America, get ready for Nevada to be the heart of the red wave!”
* Telling voters less than 72 hours before they go to the polls that you’re way ahead and will be riding the much-heralded “red wave” to victory surely dissuaded many casual GOP voters to
stay home since the election was in the bag and their vote really wasn’t needed.
* Brilliant strategery there, huh?
* Moving on to the upcoming Nevada GOPmeeting on January 14 to fill the vacancy for Nevada Republican National Committeewoman after Michele Fiore resigned following her appointment to a judicial position in Nye County.
* Right now, there are two main candidates for the office: Sigal Chattah and Pauline Lee. I know both. I like both. And I’m not taking a position on one or the other at this time.
* However, whoever wins that race will then get a vote in the race for chair of the Republican National Committee (RNC) two weeks later between incumbent Ronna McDaniel and challenger Harmeet Dhillon.
* I’m with Dhillon in that one. Nothing personal. But McDaniel has overseen three straight embarrassing election losses for the GOP nationwide. She needs to be replaced
for the same reason Nevada GOP boss Michael McDonald needs to be replaced.
* The RNC election appears to be closer than anyone imagined less than a month ago. And another Dhillon supporter, Amanda Milius, tweeted yesterday about the Nevada committeewoman election…
“Update on the war to save Nevada: Natl Committeewoman (Fiore) stepped down. Theres a meeting early Jan to elect new one. @Chattah4Nevada (Chattah) is running who endorsed @pnjaban (Dhillon). Ronna (McDaniel) recruited Pauline Lee to get in the race LAST NIGHT, thus
setting up a proxy war.”
* Absolutely not true.
* When Fiore announced that she was running for governor in the summer of 2021, many of us thought she should and would step down from the National Committee post since the #1 job of the committee peeps is to raise money for the party and Fiore would now be focusing
on raising money for her campaign.
* Around that same time, I ran into Pauline at a GOP event at the Ahern Hotel. And she told me, way back then, that if Michele stepped down, she would run for the seat.
* So when Michele finally did resign two days ago, Pauline immediately jumped into the race and told me so in a phone call. It had NOTHING to do with Ronna recruiting her.
* And to the best of my knowledge, Pauline hasn’t endorsed anyone in the RNC chair race.
* There will be reasons to vote for and against both Sigal and Pauline. But the accusation that Pauline got into the race at the behest of Ronna McDaniel isn’t one of them because it simply isn’t true.
* We now return you to your Christmas Eve gift-wrapping. Leave an extra cookie out for Santa.
FAMOUS LAST WORDS
“The U.S. military agency known for tracking Santa Claus as he delivers presents on
Christmas Eve doesn’t expect COVID-19 or the ‘bomb cyclone’ hitting North
America to affect Saint Nick’s global travels. NORAD, the North American
Aerospace Defense Command, is responsible for monitoring and defending the
skies above North America.” – Las Vegas Review-Journal, 12/24/22
Mr. Muth is president of Citizen Outreach, publisher of Nevada News & Views and
blogs at MuthsTruths.com. His views are his own.