'It's just completely tone deaf'

MAGAMarty and MAGACarrie. Trump recently endorsed a couple folks in Nevada Republican congressional primaries, Carrie Buck in CD1 and Marty O'Donnell in CD3. The National Republican Congressional Committee, acknowledging their lord and master's vote is the only one that counts in a Republican primary, has also effectively declared Buck and O'Donnell the winner of their primaries. The NRCC has added them to what it used to call its "Young Guns" list of candidates that will get extra special NRCC help on competitive races. Except now the NRCC (perhaps regretfully) calls it a "MAGA Majority” list.

What that means, according to the NRCC, is "early support, strategic resources, and visibility" for the MAGAhopefuls.

More tangibly, what it — potentially — means is spending a significant amount of money on attack ads against Democratic Reps. Dina Titus in CD1 and Susie Lee in CD3 (assuming they win primaries of their own). Typically 90% of congressional campaign committee expenditures are on attack ads.

I say "potentially" because the NRCC doesn't always follow through.

Drew Johnson was added to the Young Guns list in 2024, when he was the nominee challenging Lee in CD3. But the NRCC ignored the race financially, and spent its money elsewhere.

In fact, near as I can tell, the NRCC hasn't spent a significant amount of money attacking a Democratic House candidate in Nevada since 2018, when it spent nearly $3 million on attack ads against Democrat Steven Horsford in CD4. Reminder: Horsford won that seat in 2012, then lost it in the red wave of 2014, then came back to win it in 2018 because the Democrat who had won it in 2016 flamed out. In other words, it was an open seat.

But other than that, apart from a relentless stream of rhetorically flamboyant emails that I suspect no one in Nevada actually reads except dorks like me (sometimes), the NRCC's efforts in Nevada have been all hat and no cattle.

That said... in 2024, perhaps because Trump’s presidential campaign hoovered up all the money from everywhere, the NRCC's spending was a fraction of what it had been in earlier cycles. This year, the NRCC has a plumpy budget. But that said, it's also a tough map for House Republicans this year, and I'll believe NRCC spends big on attack ads in Nevada CD1 and CD3, instead of more competitive races elsewhere, when I see 'em.

IN NEVADA CURRENT

Check out the brain on George. In a video, the president of Las Vegas Realtors (and Lombardo chum) sports a luxury watch valued at $69,000 (according to the video), $2,800 sunglasses, and shows off his $1,200 shoes, all to a rap beat and repeated use of the N-word. “It’s just completely tone deaf,” a former LVR board member said of the sexually and racially-charged video posted by the LVR president on social media. Dana Gentry reports: No cheap sunglasses for LVR president

A trio of first-timers enter the fray to seek a seat on the North Las Vegas City Council. Ah, the hope and promise of newbies can be ... hopeful, and promising. Jeniffer Solis reports: Open NLV council seat attracts 3 first-time candidates

No way out. "Iran’s strategy is not about dominance but entanglement. It doesn’t need battlefield superiority if it can draw its adversaries into a conflict that is too costly to resolve and too complex to conclude." This analysis via The Conversation sounds way too plausible. Sadly. Middle East conflict looks increasingly like a war nobody can win

Build his beloved ballroom, stat! Clearly that's the main takeaway from all this. Jacob Fischler reports: Trump: Suspect in Washington press dinner shooting created a ‘manifesto’ for attack

Good luck