5 takeaways from Nevada's primary election

LAS VEGAS — Nevada’s November electoral matchups are set after this week’s primaries.

Nevada raised its voter participation rate during the state’s primary elections by about 5 percentage points compared with June 2024. But the turnout of 21.5% remained relatively low despite the ballots having key local, state and federal positions in play.

Other observations began to emerge as counties worked to tally their final ballots before the results are certified next week.

The Las Vegas Review-Journal combed through voter data and examined results of high-profile races to highlight some takeaways of the primaries as Nevadans prepare to vote again in the fall.

—Low participation

Nearly four-in-five registered Nevada voters stayed away from the polls during the early voting and election day periods, with the caveat that mail voting remained the most popular option.

At least 443,374 Nevadans participated in the primaries.

About 60% of them — or 266,383 voters — mailed back their ballots or dropped them off without stepping inside a voting booth.

Early, in-person voting attracted 21.3% of the electorate, and 82,690 Nevadans voted on election day, or 18.7%.

Nevada’s closed primaries limit the number of races in which nonpartisan voters can participate. While those voters make up about 46% of Clark County’s registered electorate, only 6.4% of them voted in the primaries, compared with 29.9% of Democrats and 26.9% of Republicans.

Sondra Cosgrove, College of Southern Nevada social sciences professor, said Friday that she had asked several nonpartisans this week why they didn’t vote.

Someone told her that they didn’t want to vote for the wrong candidate being that some of their ballots mostly only include judicial races they didn’t know about.

Another person told her that Nevada voted for Democrats like former President Joe Biden in 2020 and Republicans like President Donald Trump in 2024, and that nothing changed, Cosgrove said. “Inflation and bickering.”

“I don’t think they see elections as a way to actually change anything,” Cosgrove told The Las Vegas Review-Journal.

Cosgrove noted that Washoe County reported a higher turnout, which she attributed to the competitive primary races for Congressional District 2 and that county’s district attorney’s office.

—Governor’s race heats up

The campaigns of Republican Gov. Joe Lombardo and his opponent, Democratic Attorney General Aaron Ford, ignored their primary challengers throughout the process.

They ramped up attacks on each other this week.

In remarks after election day, the Democratic attorney general continued trying to tie the Republican governor’s policies to Trump’s economy.

Lombardo’s campaign, in turn, continues to attack Ford for his travel history while in office, reiterating the “high-flying Ford” moniker.

Ford said Wednesday that he talked to Nevadans of all demographics and political affiliations on the campaign trail.

“What I have heard is that people are concerned with how unaffordable our state is,” he said when asked about Lombardo’s attacks. “They want to know what leaders are going to do to address this affordability crisis that this Lombardo-Trump economy has wrought upon us.”

Lombardo can’t talk about the issues, Ford argued, because he has no record to run on despite serving for four years as governor.

“His attacks on me in that regard are a distraction,” Ford said, “They’re lies and they’re an overt effort to avoid consequences.”

Lombardo’s campaign responded with a statement.

“The Democrats’ official nominee for governor spent 420 days out of state while collecting a taxpayer funded salary,” it said. “Governor Lombardo spent the last four years showing up to work and delivering results for Nevada families.”

The campaign said that Nevada had added about 100,000 jobs, cut about 900 regulations and generated over $5 billion in new investments.

“We’ve made tremendous progress, but there is still unfinished business, and Governor Lombardo is committed to building a stronger, safer, and more affordable Nevada for everyone,” the statement said.

—Open congressional seat up north

The Republican race to replace Republican U.S. Rep. Mark Amodei in Northern Nevada’s 2nd Congressional District tested Trump’s endorsement power.

He threw his support behind Air Force veteran David Flippo while Lombardo and Amodei chose to endorse former state Sen. James Settelmeyer.

Flippo defeated Settelmeyer handedly.

Meanwhile, Democrats this week were bullish on the possibility of flipping the deep-red seat in November with former Nevada Assemblymember Teresa Benitez-Thompson as their nominee.

Nevada State Democratic Party Chair Daniele Monroe-Moreno said that the political climate has changed.

“We’re living in a different time than two years ago, four years ago, even six months ago,” she said Wednesday.

Monroe-Moreno described the Democratic nominee as a proven leader whom Nevadans of all political backgrounds are familiar with.

“I’m excited to get to work in CD-2 because I see this as a seat we can actually win this election,” the party chair said.

The four other Nevada Republicans Trump endorsed this election season were victorious: Lombardo, Lt. Gov. Stavros Anthony, congressional nominees state Sen. Carrie Buck and Marty O’Donnell, and Adriana Guzmán Fralick, who’s running for Nevada attorney general.

Lombardo endorsed more candidates than Trump and most of them won, but losses included Settelmeyer, Washoe County District Attorney Chris Hicks and Shirley Folkins-Roberts, who lost her primary for the Nevada secretary of state’s race.

—Prominent commission race

The race to replace Clark County Commissioner Justin Jones in District F has produced at least one surprise after Democrat Minja Yan came out on top in a seven-candidate primary.

Minddie Lloyd, who was endorsed by current and former county commissioners, including Jones, was trailing Yan by 15 percentage points Friday, or nearly 3,000 votes.

Yan is projected to face Republican Nev. Assemblymember Heidi Kasama, who is well ahead of businessman Albert Mack in their primary.

The campaigns of Kasama and Mack had battled it out with personal attacks accusing each candidate of not being sufficiently conservative.

The seven-member County Commission currently has a single sitting Republican in Commissioner April Becker.

—Mail voting changes in November?

Nevada officials are preparing for the possibility that an imminent U.S. Supreme Court ruling reverses state laws that allow states to count mail ballots received after election day.

The higher court is expected to decide on a case in the coming weeks and a repeal might take effect by November’s midterms.

Nevada allows returned mail ballots to be counted after Election Day: up to four days for mail postmarked by Election Day or up to three days for ballots with unclear markings.

The Supreme Court case originated in Mississippi, where the Republican National Committee and the state’s Libertarian Party sued the state over a law that allows mail ballots postmarked by election day to be accepted for five subsequent days.

“As opposed to any of the president’s executive orders, we can’t challenge a ruling by the U.S. Supreme Court or file a lawsuit against it,” said Nevada Secretary of State Francisco Aguilar in May. “We have to accept it.”