I was wrong.
I thought that the Democratic performance, validated with four consecutive presidential cycle victories, would be robust enough to overcome a strong Republican push to bank early votes. So I predicted Vice President Kamala Harris would win a squeaker here and that Sen. Jacky Rosen (D-NV) would survive. I thought the House seats would remain the same — that looks likely — and that the governor would head off a Carson City supermajority and maybe knock off an incumbent or two — that will come to pass. I also bravely foretold of GOP Rep. Mark Amodei’s win and Mayor Shelley Berkley succeeding the Goodman dynasty.
But I am not so desperate as to cling to down-ballot laurels. I was wrong at the top (although Rosen may yet hold on).
I didn’t believe the numbers would hold given the knowledge I have and past performances of The Reid Machine to turn them around. After all, they had a four presidential cycle winning streak.
On my early voting blog, I consistently showed the GOP with a substantial ballot lead, but I also did the math on mail ballots and nonpartisans and believed the comeback was possible.
Trust me: I hate to be wrong, so this had nothing to do with my cap collection not including a MAGA one. Who would want to publicly predict something and have it crumble?
I went back and forth before making that call, but I did not know what so many insiders on both sides also did not realize: that there was a mini red wave building in the country, one that would hit Nevada and change the dynamic here. I missed it, frankly, even though the initial data told me it could happen.
This was not 2014 redux in Nevada. That was a presidential year and not an off-year and this cycle’s Democratic carnage was, as I said, a miniature version of the decade-old decimation.
But I missed it. And it does not make me feel better to say so did everyone else here I know, even smart Republicans.
In one way, I am glad it was decisive so we don’t have to endure weeks of vexatious litigation and potential riots, although the divisions in this country endure. But Harris, like Hillary Clinton in 2016, has conceded.
I repeat what I wrote in my newsletter this morning:
Some will see this, perhaps gleefully, as the end of The Reid Machine in Nevada after four straight presidential wins. But I think that’s too facile, even though the governor’s team has shown it can turn out voters in ’22 and this year. The reports of its death, as a Nevadan slightly more famous than Reid might have said, are greatly exaggerated.
The Democratic machine DID turn out its voters — young, Hispanics, nonpartisans who leaned left — but they didn’t do what they usually do: vote for the Democrats.
Why? They better figure that out. Former President Donald Trump came close in Clark County, which is inconceivable. How did that happen? No taxes on this tip: The core of the party didn’t just underperform; they turned their backs.
The data was there to say Trump could flip this blue state — and I only picked Harris by 0.2 percent! — but I truly believed that the machine would do what it has done for 20 years: win.
But the machine is about math, not magic. The math/turnout was there. However, you can’t transmute anger at inflation and immigration into motivation to vote on democracy and abortion. And so here we are.
The Democrats can do all the soul-searching and navel-gazing they want, but you can’t argue that when people inclined to vote for you in the past think your leaders treat it all as a game and take you for granted, they just might go for the guy who believes it is a game and makes you feel as if you are a player.
I missed that. I was wrong. We are a red state now.
Onward!
