The Nevada Globe Interview: Newly Elected Clark County GOP Chairman Jesse Law

Jesse Law didn’t seek to be the Chairman of the Clark County Republican Party. He is more accustomed to fighting battles as a government affairs consultant.  Yet, as a passionate observer, family man, consultant and citizen, he understood that solving problems needs leadership, solutions, and a positive message to attract like-minded people in order to build a team who want to win and have fun doing it. As the newly elected GOP Chairman of Clark County, he wants to turn some heads and win elections.

The Nevada Globe: So, let’s just talk first about your election controversy. Actually, we will get to the controversy in a bit. Let’s start with the Why. Why did Jesse Law decide to run for the Clark County Chairman’s position?

Jesse Law: Sure. Certainly this was not something that I set out to do. What really took me over the edge were a series of factors. Chief among them was the disrespect of decent people who’ve been involved for a very long time. An example of one person who has been involved a long time was always a happy person. She’s not the type that loses faith or heart. But, she started to lose faith and she started to lose heart and she suddenly became an unhappy person. She was ready to give up, and it disappointed me because she doesn’t deserve it.

But there were a whole lot of stories just like hers. It wasn’t just about this one person. I really started observing what the consequences were of rejecting normal Republicans and literally treating them as the enemy–and that was absolutely happening, and many people were allowing this behavior to happen, but then pretended it didn’t exist–or, maybe they were truly aware what was happening.

When I saw this, I was looking at a repeat of the 2020 election where you literally had the Clark County party unwilling to participate with the Trump campaign, the RNC, or any of the candidates. They weren’t putting together a walk program. They prioritized, above all of the normal work of the party, they prioritized rivalry. That’s not conjecture. I’m not making that up.

Even those who didn’t vote for me, who might have resented me as a political person, were in the middle of this problem as a victim. But they looked at my statement–that the county party would rather prioritize disagreement with virtually everyone over prioritize winning elections. Many of them finally agreed. Red wave Nevada 2022 would not happen in an environment where the county would continue to prioritize rivalry, and I just wasn’t going to do allow this toxicity to continue.

You mentioned that the normal Republicans were viewed as the enemy, were these Republicans, generally, Trump supporters, establishment Republicans, maybe Republicans who like you fought for election integrity?

There’s no hesitation to agree with it as you described it. But, it was deeper than that because this was like a weird rivalry, where you did have people who profess to support the president but also encouraging or supporting blindly, or not, this terrible, terrible behavior. Yet, they would say, ‘but I’m a Trump supporter.’ Well, yeah, but you’re blind to dishonesty and disrespect of good people. There were also long-term members who were shocked and didn’t know what to do. And they were losing steam, telling me they wanted to give up. There were new members who had gone to one meeting, because there was only one meeting last year and then told they couldn’t participate or couldn’t vote because they didn’t attend two meetings! There were many who were trying to join for a long time and then being told they weren’t allowed to, while others were ushered in and allowed to participate and vote without a problem.

They were also the Filipino American conservatives who actually helped on the election integrity part that I was involved in with the Trump campaign. Totally awesome people who are trying to build conservatism in their Filipino community so they could help Republican win elections in that community, and they were being rejected. I could go down the list, but we’d be here all day.

Let’s move forward then to where you are going. There were two separate elections that produced two separate boards, and the state party, judges and the Secretary of State had to get involved. I also believe there was a Temporary Restraining Order issued against you? In spite of all of that, I believe that you are the Chairman of the Clark County GOP, correct?

The state of Rhode Island, actually heard a case like ours, and then awarded, exactly like what was awarded here: that the courts cannot intervene in an inner party dispute that has then gone up to what’s the normal channels of the state and national party. We followed everything to the letter–by the book, we followed the bylaws, and we respected people. The state party reviewed, a certified parliamentarian reviewed, and the state party executive committee accepted it. The court case was all parallel to this. I was not of fan of these moments, but I knew in the end we would we be okay. Judge Susan Johnson used the precedent established by Rhode Island.

Yes, the former leadership filed a Temporary Restraining Order that said I couldn’t raise funds or say I was Chairman, but we got that overturned. After all this drama, I don’t know what else to say other than I’m the Chairman of the Clark County Republican Party and I am very excited about what lies ahead.

Congratulations. So, when do you kick off your new term as Chairman, and how do you expect and when can you expect to grow the party, and perhaps even mend any of these fences that have been broken?

Mending the fences is definitely a priority in spite of how personal it was. You know, I may be accused of a lot, but I’m actually pretty soft-hearted when it comes to thinking of others, and trying to be the best kind of man I could be. So, I actually am interested in mending, and also as a leader, I have to know whether or not that is going to cause further damage or harm and toxicity.

Identifying the nature of the problem is important. Some make all these strange accusations and then nothing’s ever found to be true. No one is ever even interested in trying to find out if it’s true. If those are the kinds of divisive things that happen that would be something I’d want to isolate as completely inappropriate. Those who are making unfounded accusations are going to self exile. They’re going to have whatever opinion they have, but they’re not going to want to come to my meetings. What just happened in Washoe, they got off easy. By the way, they’re not going through all the strange court battles and that’s good for them. But this Saturday at the state committee meeting sort of feels like it’s going to come to a completion and then we start building.

I want Clark County to have 1500 members and an active 1000 trained for precinct work by summer– not by next August and September and October–by next July. I want these people trained–precinct training and grassroots training. To me that’s a real product going into the general election. We’re reinforcing what we need to do for those statewide races that are critical. But then there’s really exciting stuff that we can do, like I want to turn some heads. I do not want this to be a weird meeting where the organization exists for itself and we only do the business of the party. That’s the way it was, and we don’t have to do that anymore.

What is the current Clark County GOP membership and with a goal of 1500, what kind of growth does that represent?

I would measure it off of what happened last November. Last November, they had 120 attend. In July, when they were keeping people out of the meeting, they may have had 200. The first meeting I held, we had 350, the last was at least 500. I think the trajectory for November would be 700. That’s the kind of growth that we’re doing because we’re saying, ‘Look, we’re just people. But we want to solve the same problems that you in the neighborhoods want to solve, and we’re going to honor that. We’re not going to play games. We’re going to provide purpose vision, direction, and this message has been resonating.

In fact, I was shocked that we had a fundraiser for supporters and we had 350 people show up. And when I sat down to write some of the thank you cards and things like that, there were 80 people in there who weren’t even registered Republicans at the time they attended the event–who have since registered as Republicans. They paid $25 to come to a Republican fundraiser and they weren’t even Republicans when they walked in the door. They came to a fundraiser because they’re so excited about what it would mean for them to do something like this and solve the problems in society, in their neighborhood, in their city. I know we’re just a little cog, but in terms of 2022, with Washoe, Clark and the state party working together and training people, and signing up volunteers, makes me very excited for what lies ahead.

I’ve always said that people are attracted to fun and attracted to a positive message. In regards to the 80 new Republicans registrations, do they represent independent voters, new voters, or maybe crossover Democrats who are no longer interested in a party that has been taken over by the Democrat Socialists like the Nevada Democrats? 

Yes. Very specifically, yes. I’ll give you, for instance, working men and women in a union who want to see the populist policies of Trump. And for the first time in their life, are saying, ‘I was a Democrat because it was what it was, it served a function for my work. It wasn’t really about a policy or a partisan kind of thing. But, I am feeling abandoned by my trade, my leadership, or by the party that they said I was supposed to trust.’ Now, they’re coming to me saying ‘we don’t know what to do, but we definitely feel abandoned.’ If that’s not a crossover, as you describe, then I wouldn’t know what is.

We are the home that welcomes anybody that wants to seek solutions, and when we actually add purpose behind why we’re doing that, then we’re going to be able to attract many, many people. It is about positivity. I have a reputation of being really positive. And by the way, I know I’m capable of not being positive, so this is a really interesting thing to experience, and I want that for anybody that wants to seek the solutions of Republicanism. If we do that as a local party, I think we can change this state. That’s why I am here. That is the drive. And I want to be inspiration for the other folks who want to be the change, create the change, win elections and have fun while doing it.