By Laya Albert, Alicia Alvarez, Jarrett Carpenter, Siara Carpenter, Samira Felix, Jinge Li, Tatiana Sataua and Samuel Spitz
LAS VEGAS — The stakes are so high, the men who want to be vice president held competing events Saturday morning — 25 minutes and worlds apart.
While the winner here — and of the Electoral College — is still anyone’s guess, one thing is for certain. The fates of Sen. Jacky Rosen and Rep. Susie Lee are closely tied to the national mood and whether former President Donald Trump or Vice President Kamala Harris prevails.
National Republican Senatorial Committee Chairman Steve Daines of Montana was one of the headliners at a rally for Ohio Sen. JD Vance, running mate making the case for both Trump — and Sam Brown in a Senate race rated Lean Democratic by Inside Elections with Nathan L. Gonzales.
“We, through my leadership, have the responsibility to make sure that when Donald Trump is elected president we give him a Republican majority in the Senate and fire Chuck Schumer,” Daines said of the current Senate majority leader, to wild cheers inside the Whitney Recreation Center.
Walz-ing across town
At the same time, celebrities and canvassers alike were cramming into a business office to hear Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz firing up the faithful before they hit the streets. They filled the room with enthusiastic chatter.
Lee, first elected in 2018 and in a Likely Democratic race, told the on-their-toes cluster of Harris-Walz supporters they “need to connect” with voters in the final weekend of the election. Lee explained that Joe Biden won her congressional district by a margin of 13,000 in 2020 on his way to narrowly winning the Silver State, emphasizing the need for every vote possible.
“You win Congressional District 3, Kamala Harris is going to the White House. And Hakeem Jeffries is going to have that gavel in his hand,” Lee said.
House Minority Leader Jeffries wasn’t there in Nevada, but Democrats icluding Congressional Black Caucus Chairman Steven Horsford of Nevada and Congressional Hispanic Caucus Chairwoman Nanette Barragán of California were both helping promote the ticket later in the day at Taco Fest in North Las Vegas.
Walz also underlined the stakes: “You send [Lee] back and we pick up a couple seats, we’ve got Hakeem Jeffries and Democrats in charge so that President Harris’ agenda can get passed.”
At a Souls to the Polls event Sunday morning, Rep. Barbara Lee of California put a finer point on it, telling parishioners that big Democratic wins mean Jeffries would make history as the first Black speaker.
Name ID
Nevada voters didn’t seem to care much about the men who could control the House and Senate come January. In fact, conversations with dozens of people in Clark County over three days found few who could even identify their senator or her rival.
“Honestly, I just voted straight down the ballot … given the cult that is surrounding the Republican Party with the rise of Donald Trump, I don’t trust any Rs at this point,” said Daniel Connaway, who moved to Nevada 24 years ago from Florida. He said growing up in the South he was “ostracized for having Black friends.”
Just after casting his vote Friday in the final hours of in-person early voting at the Sahara West Library, Connaway said he made his choice to back Harris considering the future for his daughter.
Other Nevadans who have yet to vote seem to be in a similar position.
“Over the last few years I’ve felt that it was more important if you want your president to do something, then you’re going to have to vote for people that also agree with their policies,” said Holdyn Heath, 26, who was attending the Taco Fest Saturday with his father.
Still, he wasn’t aware of who was running for office.
“I don’t know the names, we just moved here,” said Heath, who moved to North Las Vegas from Tennessee with his family in September and is currently looking for employment.
“Depending on the policies, I’ve always mostly gone Republican because it’s less government and more for the people, but it mostly depends on the policies,” Heath said. He said he was undecided before Saturday, but will be backing Trump at the polls. His father Shawn Heath, 50, was carrying a “Latino Americans for Donald Trump” sign under his arm while exploring Taco Fest.
Anyone turning on a television here over the weekend was inundated with ads. Many labeled Brown and also Lee’s opponent Drew Johnson as an extremist on abortion — another message Democrats are using to get out the vote across the country.
“This election is literally life or death,” said “Only Murders in the Building” star Eva Longoria at the Walz event. “Especially for women.”
Brown responds
Nevada Republican Senate hopeful Sam Brown walks back to his own tent after greeting supporters of his rival Sen. Jacky Rosen at the Taco Fest in Las Vegas on Nov. 2. (Christina Bellantoni/USC Annenberg Media)
Brown said in an interview Saturday that the ads showing he opposes abortion “without any exceptions” are misleading and false, especially given his own wife’s abortion story. Brown met her shortly following her abortion when she was still healing from this “traumatic” experience, he said, and he does support exceptions.
“It’s just so disappointing that Senator Rosen and her allies would knowingly lie about my position,” Brown said. “If they were trying to make this a partisan, deceptive attack against me is shameful, and we don’t need any more of that.”
On the ballot in Nevada is Prop 6 to enshrine the right to an abortion in the Nevada Constitution. This right is currently protected under Nevada law but the measure’s passage would make it harder to overturn.
Reproductive Freedom For All honored Dia de Los Muertos with an ofrenda, or offering-altar, featuring women from all over the country who died from lack of access to abortion care at a Harris phone bank Friday.
Organizers said both the presidential and Senate races matter.
The group’s president, Mini Timmaraju, stressed the importance of voting up and down the ballot in order to send hypothetical President Harris a federal bill to restore the protections of Roe v. Wade.
“But if Kamala Harris doesn’t win, she doesn’t get to sign that bill,” Timmaraju said. “If Jacky Rosen doesn’t win, that bill doesn’t go to her desk. You’ve got to win all of it.”
Rosen spent the final week of the campaign traveling between Reno and Las Vegas to meet with workers and encourage early voting. She was joined by Jimmy Kimmel, Illinois Sen. Tammy Duckworth and local organizers. Sunday morning she attended a canvass kickoff with the hosts of Pod Save America launched out of a home not far from downtown Las Vegas.
She downplayed Daines’ comments about a Republican majority in the Senate.
“I feel comfortable that we’re going to maintain the Senate majority because we have the enthusiasm,” Rosen said in an interview. “If you want the freedom to be able to speak out, speak up, have health care, have education and have choice, then the choice is clear. It’s to vote for Democrats.”
Most of the six speakers at the Saturday Vance rally — including the vice presidential nominee and Utah Sen. Mike Lee — sharply criticized Rosen.
“Unfortunately, you guys have got one of the worst senators,” Vance told the over-capacity crowd, labeling Rosen as “a person who pretends to be a reasonable moderate.”
“She doesn’t support Nevada values. You know who will support Nevada values is the great Sam Brown,” Vance said.
Daines made an even more direct link to Senate power, asking the crowd to imagine Trump returning to the White House and sending nominations for Treasury, Defense, State and CIA to the Senate.
“If Jacky Rosen were elected, she would vote ‘No’ on every single one of those nominees and you can take it to the bank,” Daines said. “If you elected Sam Brown, he would vote ‘Yes’ with President Trump.”
Helen Shapiro, 70, recently retired as an accounting manufacturing manager and moved to Nevada from Fontana, Calif., for lower costs. She said Brown is equivalent to Trump while “Rosen stands firm with Kamala Harris.”
“I don’t trust Sam Brown to do anything good for the state,” Shapiro said before heading out to canvass for Harris and Walz. “He’s a MAGA, and MAGA will do anything to hurt the people.”
Will Anderson stands near The Voter Truck at a canvass event in Las Vegas on Nov. 3. (Christina Bellantoni/USC Annenberg Media)
Rosen wasn’t there, but parked outside of the Walz event was The Voter Truck, a grassroots organization created in response to the 2016 election, dedicated to elevating artists and letting their voices be heard. The neon signs are “perfect for Nevada,” explained Will Anderson, a volunteer with the organization for the last two years.
Anderson said he started in his home state of Georgia to help re-elect Sen. Raphael Warnock. This cycle, he’s left his home state of Georgia to help Rosen’s re-election bid. “In order to retain Senate control, we are going all in here,” he said.
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