(Joseph Tatner) – It seems Michele Fiore can’t make up her mind on whether or not she was recruited. She recently said to Examiner.com reporter Sara Crusade:
Fiore agreed to comment briefly by telephone stating, “First, (Nevada GOP Chairman Chris) Comfort didn’t recruit me, and the Rule 11 letter was just a gracious gift from the party. I’m the same candidate in the CD1 race as I was in the SD9 race.”
Yet in a recent email blast she says, “Thank you for your support in the Nevada State Senate District 9 race. However, I was RECENTLY APPROACHED to take down a bigger opponent.” [emphasis added]
Add to this the comment many of us heard her proudly say at the candidate mixer last Friday evening: “Well, when the leader of your Party comes to you and says there are no viable candidates in the race and asks you to step up for the good of the Party, you can’t say no!”
Rather than be confrontational (since I am a candidate and this seemed like an insult), I laughed and said, “Well, you know, there are some of us that would disagree that there are ‘no viable candidates’ in this race.” Michele immediately backpedalled and said, “Oh, well, that’s what THEY said!”
The last time I checked, the leader of the State Party was Chris Comfort and still is — for now. And how could it not be Comfort, when he is the only one who has been monkeying around in the CD1 race and others?
So, she was recruited, but wasn’t recruited, and was recruited…?
And by the way, both Craig Lake and I did say no to Chris Comfort when he personally approached us. He tried to get each of us to drop out weeks ago when we were the only two active candidates in CD1. He suggested Craig switch to the Secretary of State race where Republican Rob Lauer was already running.
Comfort also unsuccessfully tried to get Bill Parson and others to drop out of the US Senate race and convinced Chuck Flume to switch from that race to CD1, saying “You’re our man…there are no other viable candidates in the race…we are going to give you all the support you need.” He said this to Chuck last month, then told him on Wednesday, March 10, “We found another girl that’s going to run.”
Then the next day, Comfort was back to, “You’re our man.” It seems clear that the strategy was for no one to know about the Fiore switch so no other candidate could jump in against Dennis Nolan, who would have been unopposed in the Republican Primary for State Senate District 9. However, Elizabeth Halseth heard about it and switched into that race with less than two hours to spare. Nolan has a record of voting with the GOP only 23% of the time and Fiore had a great deal of support against him in the primary. Now that support has switched to Elizabeth.
This wasn’t about beating Shelley Berkley. This was clearly about saving Nolan and flooding the CD1 field to muddy the waters to save Berkley as well. For whatever reason, the State Republican Party leaders have never supported any candidate against Berkley in 12 years, that’s the only reason she is perceived as “unbeatable.”
Why should we believe Chris Comfort was going to try to beat Berkley this time when he was saving Dennis Nolan, who is no Conservative by any means, and when Sig Rogich just endorsed Harry Reid for another term as Senator?
Chuck once challeneged me to do my research on Berkley if I was going to run against her. I have. What I found is shocking, but perhaps not surprising. That may be a good subject for the future. She is in no way “unbeatable.”
The Chinese have a curse, “May you live in interesting times.” Politically speaking, these are interesting times indeed.
(Mr. Tatner is a Republican candidate for Nevada’s First Congressional District)
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