Jacky Rosen Sails, Sam Brown Soars, Jeff Gunter Sours

Captain Sam Brown soared to victory in the Nevada primary to face Democratic Senator Jacky Rosen in the general election in November, securing former President Donald Trump’s endorsement two days before election day (which apparently isn’t sitting well with GOP primary challenger Dr. Jeff Gunter).

Data pulled at noon today from the Nevada Secretary of State shows that Brown received 96,624 votes (59.9 percent) in the crowded Republican primary of eleven contenders, whereas Senator Rosen received 136,015 (91.5 percent) in the Democratic primary. Her closest challenger, out of two, received only 5,454 votes.

In total, 161,208 votes were cast in the Republican primary compared to 148,616 cast in the Democratic primary. To note, per Nevada law, ballots are tabulated until four days after election day, with or without a postmark, so the vote count increases as the tabulation continues.

Overall, if the trend continues, Republican voters have narrowly out-numbered Democrat voters in the battleground race, but just thousands of votes in Nevada previously determined which party controlled the U.S. Senate.

In the 2022 election, Adam Laxalt lost to Senator Catherine Cortez Masto by a mere 8,000 votes (less than one percent) in a race that featured new election laws unilaterally passed by the Democratic majority in the state legislature and included extended ballot tabulation dates and universal mail balloting.

Although Nevada Democrats passed sweeping changes to Nevada’s election laws in 2021, these transformative laws did not, as they claimed, increase voter participation in the primary elections that followed. The voter turn out in the primary is trending at an abysmal 18 percent, a percentage not recorded since 2008.

Granted, general elections have historically increased voter participation, but the delta between the candidates for control of the U.S. Senate, combined with the lack of voter participation, is cause for concern and a challenge to the Brown campaign. Over 10,000 voters chose “none of these candidates” in both primaries.

Brown will now have to coalesce and unite Republicans who chose one of his 11 opponents, as well as the majority of independent voters, to clinch what is expected to be a “toss up” race by Cook Political Report. In the latest NY Times/Sienna poll, Brown and Rosen are tied at 41 percent.

In response to Gunter’s comments to the AP, Attorney Sigal Chattah, Nevada RNC National Committeewoman and former supporter of Gunter, united behind Brown, stating: “Any attempts to marginalize the candidate that was elected will be met with fierce dissent from the party…Regardless of my [prior] sentiment, I’m the RNC committeewoman, and I’m a Republican. And I will support the Republican candidate unequivocally.”

Outside of the ballot-harvesting infrastructure of the unions, Rosen has the advantage of incumbency and a sizable campaign war chest. Brown, an Army veteran, needs to put some bigger numbers on the FEC reports if he expects to fight effectively against the well-recycled Democratic narrative.

Democratic donors from California, New York and Massachusetts contributed close to $4 million in the last quarter of 2023 to Rosen’s reelection campaign. According to FEC documents, out-of-state donors accounted for over 90 percent of the approximate $3.2 million Rosen raised in that period, compared to less than nine percent donated by Nevada residents. From January 2023 to May 2024, Rosen has raised nearly $20 million with a total cash-on-hand of over $10.2 million.

In comparison, over 30 percent that  Brown raised in the last quarter of 2023 came from Nevadans. To date, Brown has raised over $7 million and has nearly $3 million cash on hand.

Early in the campaign, Senator Rosen featured Brown as her likely opponent, referring to him as a “MAGA extremist” who is a “direct threat to Nevada’s reproductive freedom.” Democrats have recycled these attacks on Republicans with claims that any GOP challenger, like Brown, will repeal Obamacare, gut Medicare and Social Security, and ban abortion.

Although these Democratic talking points have been the narrative de jour for decades, polled Independent and Latino voters cite the economy and inflation as their primary concerns. As Rosen has voted with Biden over 93 percent of the time, Republicans have tied her support of Biden to the inflationary economy and the border crisis.

Republican leaders are focusing on Biden’s ‘inflation nightmare’ and ‘border nightmare’ and were central themes of former President Donald Trump’s rally in Las Vegas last Sunday. Trump stated,“If we win Nevada, we win the whole thing. We win the whole thing.”

Kristy Wilkinson echoed Trump’s sentiments to the AP, stating, “Nevada voters are clearly united behind our grassroots campaign to end the Biden-Rosen American Nightmare. And that is what we’re 100% focused on.”

Editors note: The Globe will be interviewing Sam Brown next month. We have extended a request to the Rosen campaign.