Indy Elections: A fact-check bonanza
Indy Elections is The Nevada Independent’s newsletter devoted to comprehensive and accessible coverage of the 2024 elections, from the race for the White House to the bid to take control of the Legislature.
In today’s edition: Questionable campaign ads are everywhere, so we decided to add some much-needed context to a few of them. Plus: Polls show the presidential race is a toss-up in Nevada (cue the #WeMatter reminder), Rep. Mark Amodei (R-NV) goes up on TV for the first time since 2018 and the latest on a GOP challenge to mail ballots.
Forget brat summer; it’s officially election time: Like the prophetic rodent Punxsutawney Phil signaling the end of winter, The Boss’ early voting blog means election season has begun.
Mail-in ballots have started to arrive. In Washoe County, officials said that mail ballots went out Wednesday and will likely arrive in voters’ mailboxes next week. In Clark County, mail ballots are expected to be mailed no later than Thursday.
Carson City residents have reported receiving their ballots, but they will all be remailed to voters next week after they erroneously listed a candidate for Congressional District 2 as a Democrat instead of a member of the Independent American Party. Scott Hoen, the county’s recorder, did not respond to a phone call for more information Wednesday.
REMINDER: If you are not yet registered to vote, online registration is available until Oct. 22 at this link.
And a quick programming note: Thanks to a deluge of election news, we will publish this newsletter twice weekly. Stay tuned for our Tuesday edition.
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We want to hear from you! Send us your questions, comments, observations, jokes or what you think we should be covering or paying attention to. Email your newsletter editor Tabitha Mueller at tabitha@thenvindy.com.
By the Numbers:
- 9 days until early voting begins
- 26 days until Election Day
- 116 days until the 83rd legislative session
A bevy of fact checks
By Gabby Birenbaum, Eric Neugeboren and Tabitha Mueller
Happy election season!
Recently, we’ve seen some ads that need additional context and clarification. We’ve broken them out by topic below.
Abortion
In the House races, each of the three Las Vegas-area Democrats have cut attack ads on abortion. Rep. Dina Titus’ (D-NV) ad featured her standing outside of an exam room and saying her opponent, Mark Robertson, supported a near-total ban on abortion. Rep. Susie Lee (D-NV) claimed her opponent, Drew Johnson, would let politicians enact a nationwide abortion ban. And Rep. Steven Horsford’s (D-NV) negative ad on opponent John Lee says Lee “wants to ban abortion.”
Are they true? It’s kind of muddy.
Robertson and John Lee have more direct histories of supporting abortion bans. Robertson has said that he believes life begins at conception, and said in 2022 that he was thankful for the Texas Heartbeat Act, which banned most abortions at the six-week mark. But post-Roe, he now says he would not support any federal action that goes against the will of the people of his district, including their support of Nevada’s settled law protecting abortion.
Titus’ claims are all based on the opinions Robertson expressed in the 2022 campaign cycle, and don’t reflect his latest position. The ad does say that Robertson supports a near total ban with no exceptions — but he has clarified, dating back to 2022, that he supports exceptions for rape, incest and the life of the mother.
Horsford, meanwhile, said his opponent “wants to ban abortion.” This is based on John Lee’s position while running for governor in 2021, when he said he would support a heartbeat bill, which typically bans abortion at six weeks. While John Lee now says abortion has been appropriately returned to the states, the ad’s claim correctly reflects his past positions.
Finally, Susie Lee’s ad on Drew Johnson is the most difficult to parse. Johnson, a longtime libertarian, has said he is opposed to a national abortion ban and approved of the Dobbs decision because it leaves the question to the states.
Susie Lee’s ad says that “anti-abortion extremists in Washington want Drew Johnson in Congress” — based on his endorsements from members who have sponsored the Life at Conception Act, a bill that would amount to a national abortion ban by federally defining life as beginning at the moment of conception.
Next, the ad says “Johnson and those extremists want to let politicians ban abortion” without exceptions, “and the abortion ban these extremists and Drew Johnson would let politicians enact would be nationwide.”
This is a complex bit of wording, but saying that the other members of Congress want a nationwide abortion ban is fair. Including Johnson with them, though, is a stretch, given that he has maintained he would not vote for such a bill. “Would let,” of course, is a bit different than “vote for” — and so the veracity of the claim depends on how seriously you take endorsements.
Do candidates have constituents?
A series of PAC-man-style campaign advertisements from the pro-Democrat New Day Nevada PAC have targeted Republicans in competitive legislative races, claiming that “for too long, politicians like [insert name here] have been ghosting their constituents in favor of money from wealthy corporate donors.”
The ads feature the candidate’s face moving around a PAC-man game, eating dollar signs.
“From abandoning public schools to opposing capping rents, refusing to crack down on corporate landlords, this November it’s game over for [candidate name here],” a narrator says.
The only catch: All but one of the candidates targeted in the four ads have never held office, and therefore never technically represented constituents.
Those candidates include April Arndt, who is running for Assembly District 21, Rebecca Edgeworth in Assembly District 35 and David Brog, who is running for Assembly District 34.
Sen. Carrie Buck (R-Henderson) was the only candidate criticized by the ads who actively serves in office.
Capital improvements
Better Nevada PAC, a group tied to Republican Gov. Joe Lombardo, has released two ads attacking vulnerable Assembly Democrats that accuse them of spending millions of dollars for new offices and additional staff members.
The ads — targeting Assemblywoman Elaine Marzola (D-Las Vegas) and Assemblywoman Selena La Rue Hatch (D-Reno) — allege that they spent $127 million on new government offices in Las Vegas for themselves and other colleagues, as well as $30 million for an additional 117 staff members.
The ads are referring to the Capital Improvement Program budget bill passed by lawmakers last year that allocated funds for more than $1.4 billion in state government infrastructure projects.
The ad misleads voters by implying that Marzola and La Rue Hatch were responsible for the passage of the bill.
In reality, Lombardo prioritized the legislation, which the Legislature is constitutionally required to pass. He called a special session to pass the budget bill after it became a bargaining chip used as leverage in unrelated disputes and failed to garner enough support in the regular session.
Ultimately, four Republican legislators supported the bill, including Assembly Minority Leader P.K. O’Neill (R-Carson City). In fact, if La Rue Hatch and Marzola had opposed the bill, it still would have passed.
Plus, it was Lombardo who originally called for more funding for Las Vegas office space, eyeing $350 million to construct two new state government buildings.
What we’re reading and writing
In Reno, Walz touts home health care plan, Harris receives first Nevada tribe endorsement by Tabitha Mueller
Home health care plans, seven phone calls to Russian President Vladimir Putin and less than a month until the election, oh my!
Rosen raises $12.1 million in third quarter of Senate race, her best haul yet by Gabby Birenbaum
In this case, mo’ money, mo’ problems isn’t quite accurate.
Indy Poll Watch
Napolitan News/RMG Research (Sept. 30-Oct. 3)
- 782 likely voters
- Margin of error: 3.5 percent
- Findings
- Harris 49%, Trump 49%
- Rosen 56%, Brown 40%
This poll from Rasmussen confirms what we all know in the presidential race — it’s a toss-up. The crosstabs show that Trump is up 2 percentage points with Hispanic voters, which would represent a generational realignment (Biden won Latinos by 26 points). Trump is also leading with independents by 15 percentage points — that level of movement with both independents and Hispanics would indicate an excellent night for him in November.
In the Senate race, Rosen’s strong position owes to her dominance with independents and the presence of crossover voters in this survey. She’s winning independents by 24 points and even pulling 20 percent of Republicans. While a candidate winning a statewide race in Nevada by 16 points is about as likely as the Raiders making the Super Bowl, the strong showing demonstrates why the race is thought to lean toward Rosen.
Redfield & Wilton/The Telegraph (Sept. 27-Oct. 2)
- 607 likely voters
- Margin of error: ~4.5 percent
- Harris: 48%, Trump 47%
- Rosen 48%, Brown 41%
The crosstabs here aren’t as full, but again — it’s close.
— Gabby Birenbaum
Indy Ad Watch
TREND WE’RE FOLLOWING: Amodei spends on ads in a general election (is this real life??)
For the first time since at least 2018, Rep. Mark Amodei (R-NV) is reserving ad space in a general election.
Amodei, the lone Republican in Nevada’s congressional delegation whose district is primarily rural, has spent or reserved about $110,000 in general election ads so far. He is still lagging significantly behind Independent Greg Kidd, who is primarily self-funding his nonpartisan campaign and has been on the airwaves since June, spending more than $3 million in ads.
Unseating Amodei is still an extremely tall order given his district’s Republican lean.
— Eric Neugeboren
The Lightning Round
🧑⚖️ Nevada Supreme Court hears arguments in non-postmarked ballot suit — In the GOP lawsuit related to the alleged counting of non-postmarked mail ballots, pairs of justices appeared skeptical on Tuesday of both sides’ arguments. The GOP’s appeal — after losing in front of a Carson City judge — accuses election officials of violating the state law that allows counting of ballots received up to three days after Election Day “if the date of the postmark cannot be determined.” The party also says this alleged violation disproportionately harms Republicans.
— Eric Neugeboren
Looking Ahead
- Thursday, Oct. 10: Univision hosts a town hall with Vice President Kamala Harris in Las Vegas.
- Friday, Oct. 11: Donald Trump hosts a rally in Reno.
- Saturday, Oct. 12: Trump and Sam Brown host a roundtable with Hispanic voters in Henderson.
— Gabby Birenbaum and Eric Neugeboren
And to ease you into the weekend, a few “posts” to “X” that caught our eye:
- I guess if you win, everything is good.
- This is horrifying.
- Who doesn’t love a good explosion?
We’ll see you next week.
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