A significant surge in Republican early voters may prove to be a game changer in a Sun Belt state that hasn’t gone red since 2004. The Nevada Independent reported that conservative Nevadans now outnumber Democratic early and mail-in voters, a phenomenon that rarely occurs given Democrats’ strong enthusiasm for voting on days other than Election Day.
Veteran journalist Jon Ralston noted that an overnight increase in Democratic ballots from populous Clark County wasn’t enough to offset the GOP’s advantage in early voting, where Republicans have submitted 38,000 more ballots than Democrats, giving them a 5.3% lead. Statewide, GOP voters have turned in 40,000 more ballots than their Democratic counterparts, resulting in a 5.7% advantage. “This has never happened, not even close, in The Reid Machine Era,” Ralston wrote, referencing the late Senate leader Harry Reid.
Clark County, home to Las Vegas, is at the forefront of Republican enthusiasm for delivering Trump a victory in a state that last supported the Republican nominee in 2004. In this county, Republicans are nearly 9% ahead in voter turnout, while the “typically reliable Clark Dem firewall has all but vanished,” Ralston notes. Unlike in 2020 or 2022, the current phenomenon is unprecedented, highlighting the extent of Republicans’ desire for Trump to return to the White House. “This is a unicorn year. We have never seen this,” he adds.
Nevadans, including a transient workforce of service industry voters living in the heart of the nation’s housing crisis, appear to be frustrated with giving Democrats the benefit of the doubt in each presidential election. Earlier this month, Politico reported that Trump has opened a 5-point lead over Harris, a surprising turn of events in a state that Trump lost by nearly 2.5 points four years ago and was expected to remain out of reach this cycle. Instead, the former president has established or widened leads in several critical swing states, including Arizona, Michigan, Wisconsin, Pennsylvania, North Carolina, and Georgia—all of which will play a vital role in determining the election winner.
In an effort to stem the losses, Harris adopted Trump’s promise to eliminate taxes on tipped wages in August, a policy that has gained significant popularity in Las Vegas’s service industry. However, despite leading for much of her brief campaign, the Democrat has now fallen below a winning average, according to FiveThirtyEight: she is currently 0.2% behind Trump in a composite of the latest polls, one of which indicated Trump is ahead by 3 points.