Hello from Las Vegas, where the Nevada caucuses – the next contest in the race for the White House – will be held on Saturday.
But the caucuses actually already started – as roughly 75,000 people took part in early voting from Saturday through Tuesday. That’s nearly as much at the 84,000 who caucused four years ago in the Democratic contest. The record turnout in Nevada took place in 2008 – when 118,000 caucused for the Democrats.
While the heavy turnout in the early voting encouraged Democrats, some issues have already emerged. The Nevada Democratic Party was in the process of telling approximately 1,000 people that their early voting ballots had been voided. The overwhelming majority of those ballots were tossed because of a lack of a signature.
After the reporting debacle in Iowa – where technical issues with the reporting app led to a trickle of results that spanned three days – there are concerns about Nevada as well. The state party was going to use the same app – but dropped it quickly after the mess in Iowa. They’ve been holding training classes all week with volunteers to learn how to use party-owned iPads that will access the raw vote totals from the caucus precincts and transmit the data to the party headquarters.
But Democratic National Committee Chairman Tom Perez isn’t guaranteeing that we’ll see results from Saturday’s caucuses that evening. The contests start at noon PST, which is 3 p.m. in New Hampshire. The caucuses should conclude by 2 p.m. in Nevada, or 5 p.m. here. Still, that may not be enough time.
“We’re going to do our best to release results as soon as possible, but our North Star, again, is accuracy,” Perez told reporters out here this week.
Like in Iowa, Nevada Democrats will report three numbers from their caucuses – the raw vote totals from the first round, the raw vote totals from the realignment vote, and the percentage each candidate gets of state delegate equivalents. And as with Iowa – and New Hampshire – there’s a 15% threshold to hit to earn delegates.
Talking about New Hampshire – not to brag – but there was record turnout and pretty smooth reporting of the results.
It’s pretty much baked in at this point that Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont will win the caucuses.
The populist senator who’s making his second-straight bid for the Democratic presidential nomination basically tied former South Bend, Ind., Mayor Pete Buttigieg in Iowa – and edged Buttigieg for victory last week in New Hampshire.
An average of the latest public opinion polls conducted in Nevada gives Sanders a double-digit lead over former Vice President Joe Biden – with Buttigieg and Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts just a couple of percentage points behind Biden, and billionaire and environmental and progressive advocate Tom Steyer and Sen. Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota just cracking double digits.
Former New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg’s not on the ballot in Nevada – even though he took the stage (and took the hits) at Wednesday’s Democratic presidential nomination debate along the Strip in Las Vegas.
The multi-billionaire business and media mogul announced even before he jumped into the race in late November that he would skip campaigning in the early voting states (Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina) that hold contests in February and instead concentrate his efforts in the delegate-rich Super Tuesday states that vote on March 3 – and beyond.
Bloomberg – by the way – spent an eye-popping and unprecedented $460 million dollars from when he jumped into the race after Thanksgiving through the end of January, according to a financial report filed Thursday by his campaign. The load of cash was used to flood the airwaves and social media with ads from coast to coast – and to hire an army of campaign staffers and advisers across the country.
After disappointing third- and fourth-places finishes in Iowa and New Hampshire, Warren’s super-charged debate performance Wednesday night was a necessity.
Warren showed no mercy in the prime-time showdown – which was watched by more than 20 million people, a total far higher than any previous Democratic debate this election cycle. The progressive senator repeatedly slammed Bloomberg over his treatment of women and his controversial policing practice of “stop and frisk” during his tenure as New York City’s mayor. And she tore apart the health care proposals of some of her other rivals.
Asked by reporters the day after the debate if her breakout performance was too little, too late, Warren pushed back.
“We’ve heard from 2% of the country. We’ve got 98% left to go and the way I see it is because I did not spend 70% of time on fundraising, but instead spent it out doing town halls in 29 states and Puerto Rico and I now have offices in 31 states, I now have more than a million donors nationwide. … We’re just getting started,” she said.
The debate pumped up Warren supporters in Nevada.
Sharon Shane of Las Vegas – who was in the crowd as Warren energized supporters at a stop at a campaign field office – said she loved the debate performance.
“I was yelling at the TV, clapping! Because that’s exactly what I would have said to Bloomberg, you know,” Shane said. “Somebody also needs to say that to Trump, and she’s the one to do it.”
Elise Hembree was sitting next to Shane and is a fellow Warren campaign precinct captain.
The Las Vegas resident said the debate “boosted Warren” as she raved that her candidate “did such a wonderful job. She put Mr. Bloomberg in his billion-dollar place and pointed out the hypocrisy of the way he is.”
After spending so much time in Iowa and New Hampshire over the past 14 months, the race for the White House is spreading across the country.
The candidates are bouncing around – campaigning in Nevada and South Carolina – which holds its primary a week after Nevada’s caucuses. But the White House contenders are also making plenty of stops in the 14 states that hold contests on Super Tuesday – which is now just a week and a half away.
And there’s obviously less of an emphasis on retail politics – as TV, radio, internet and social media ads become a more effective way of reaching out to the magnitude of voters spread out across the country.