Nevada Democrats Didn’t Win; Republicans Lost

Chuck Muth is president of Citizen Outreach and publisher of Nevada News & Views

(Chuck Muth) – Last week Nevada Republicans lost 2 of their 3 congressional seats and failed to reclaim Harry Reid’s U.S. Senate seat.

All proving once again that Nevada Republicans never blow an opportunity to blow an opportunity.

Let’s take a closer look at some of the results…

Indeed, the Democrats’ victory was less about the media’s vaunted “Latino” vote as it was about the conservative vote and GOP’s failure to court third-party voters.  Some examples…

Joe Heck lost the U.S. Senate race by about 25,000 votes.  But there were almost 85,000 votes cast for conservative candidates OTHER than the Democrat candidate who won – including our friend Tom Jones of the IAP – in addition to 42,000 votes cast for “None of the Above.”

If you don’t think there were 25,000 conservatives out of that 85,000 who didn’t vote for Heck because of (a) his generally more moderate voting record as a congressman and (b) his last-minute decision to “un-endorse” Trump, you’re in denial.

The Latino vote didn’t elect Catherine Cortez-Masto-Reid; the conservative vote un-elected Heck.

Heck’s a good man.  And Nevada would have been FAR better off with Heck in the GOP majority in the Senate with Republican Trump in the White House.  But as they say, actions have consequences.

A similar situation existed in both the 3^rd and 4^th congressional district races…

In the 3rd, Republican Danny Tarkanian lost by less than 4,000 votes.  But a pair of conservative independent candidates racked up a combined 21,000 votes between them – far more than the margin of victory for the Democrat.

In the 4^th, Republican incumbent Rep. Cresent Hardy – another who “un-endorsed” Trump late in the game – lost by a little over 10,000 votes.  The fiscally conservative Libertarian and IAP candidates in that race chalked up more than 18,000 votes – again, well over the margin of victory for the Democrat.