No one can ever predict what exactly will happen in an election, but if the primary is any indication, the 2000 campaign cycle may go down as one of the strangest in recent Nevada history. An embattled Clark County commissioner, who should have won, lost. A commissioner targeted by powerful labor unions, who should have lost, won. And the mighty gaming industry was unsuccessful in wiping out one of its staunchest critics. In politics, all this is the equivalent of Tiger Woods not winning a golf tournament, Strom Thurmond not running for re-election or the swallows not returning to Capistrano. It just doesn’t happen.
Commissioner Lance Malone’s loss to an under-funded, little-known opponent was a perhaps the greatest shock. Malone had piled up negatives after several controversial votes, including one over airport concessions for which the Ethics Commission found him guilty of not disclosing a relationship with one of the applicants. The Commission District C representative was also targeted by Station Casinos after agreeing to vote against a competing casino project, then changing his mind at the 11th hour. All these factors, combined with an extremely low turnout (19 percent) gave challenger Chip Maxfield the unlikely upset and a ticket to the general election where he will meet Democrat Lois Tarkanian.
The other commission race that shook up Southern Nevada was Mary Kincaid vs. Stephanie Smith. Heavily targeted by the Culinary Union, the incumbent Kincaid was not the favorite to retain her seat. The union has a history of diligently and effectively erasing the competition when it gets heavily engaged in a race. In 1996, that’s exactly what it did to State Senator Sue Lowden. Its grassroots effort is superb and its direct mail is targeted and deadly. This year, however, Kincaid was able to garner enough support to hold off the onslaught. She had very high positives and name identification in the district, having lived in and represented most of it for decades. Kincaid also benefited from a near $1 million war chest that gave her the ability to flood the airwaves and mailboxes with positive messages and defenses of her position. The union doesn’t lose often, and even in defeat it sent a powerful message to future opponents: “We will use every means at our disposal to defeat you, so think twice before crossing us.”
A group that has had similar success with that kind of incentive is the gaming industry. While it never publicly endorsed Uri Clinton over incumbent Joe Neal in the State Senate 4 race, it was widely known that gaming wanted Neal out. The senator has been a thorn in its side ever since he proposed raising the tax on gaming revenues. He is currently trying to qualify a ballot initiative to let the voters decide the issue. No one had really ever thought to challenge him in the district he has represented since 1972. But Clinton, a young and energetic challenger, was just the kind of candidate who could give Neal fits and distract him from qualifying the initiative.
Because no Republican filed, the race would have normally gone to the general election, where Clinton could count on some anti-Neal Republican voters coming to his aide. But a third-party candidate jumped in, forcing a primary. Under state law, a candidate can win the race outright if he gets 50 percent of the votes plus one vote in the primary. Clinton put up a valiant effort involving mailers, phoning and door-to-door canvassing, but he couldn’t overcome Neal’s staying power in the district, missing his chance to force a general election by only six votes.
It’s not likely these powerful forces will soon lose another election like they did in this year’s primary. The Culinary Union is already analyzing the Smith-Kincaid race and will learn from its mistakes. It was always an outside shot that gaming would take out Neal, and most pundits say its real motivation was to slow him down from qualifying the tax increase.
For the immediate future, losers are licking their wounds, and winners are turning their eyes northward to Carson City for the 71st Session of the Nevada Legislature.