Nevada caucus an obscure exercise

By Steve Kanigher (contact)

Sunday, March 5, 2000 | 9:07 a.m.

Nevada is little more than a bystander when it comes to deciding the Democratic and Republican nominees for president.

Compared to the national media focus on the New Hampshire primaries that sets the tone for presidential campaigns, Nevada's caucus process is an obscure exercise that does little more than rile up party activists.

For Nevada Democrats their March 12 caucus will occur five days after major "Super Tuesday" primaries are held in delegate-rich California and New York. Some pundits believe Vice President Al Gore will have the Democratic nomination virtually wrapped up if his opponent, former New Jersey Sen. Bill Bradley, doesn't do well that day.

"The advantage of a caucus is that it increases the power of activists who are willing to spend time in the process," Nevada Democratic Party Chairman Rory Reid said. "A primary increases participation at the expense of activism. As political parties have seen their power wane caucuses are among the last vestiges of party power."

Nevada Republicans held their precinct meetings in Clark County on Feb. 23 and plan to do so elsewhere in the state this month. But the state party made its caucus nonbinding. That means Nevada GOP delegates can vote for the candidate of their choice when they attend the Republican National Convention in Philadelphia July 31 through Aug. 3.

"Four years ago Delaware as a state was stuck with Steve Forbes at the national convention long after he was out," said Ryan Erwin, executive director of the Nevada Republican Party. "Our position is that we can go with a winner. Also, if the nomination is still undecided at the convention, any state with undecided delegates becomes real powerful."

Both parties held state primaries in 1976 that were won by Republican Ronald Reagan and Democrat Jerry Brown, respectively. But because of concern over election costs, the Nevada Legislature gave the parties the option to hold caucuses, which they did from 1980 forward. The lone exception was the GOP state primary in 1996, won by former Kansas Sen. Bob Dole.

Unlike primaries, which encourage broad participation through the ballot box, caucuses are usually attended by far fewer individuals. But those who attend are typically far more intense about politics than the public, making caucuses vulnerable to extreme factions within the parties.

Examples were the victories in Nevada by Republican television evangelist Pat Robertson in 1988 and Brown, the former California governor, in 1992.

It would be a major upset if Gore failed to win the Democratic caucus because he has history on his side. He won the state caucus as a presidential candidate in 1988, and he and President Clinton carried Nevada in the 1992 and 1996 general elections.

Gore, a frequent visitor to Nevada, also is the only presidential candidate with a campaign office in this state. His Las Vegas office, which he rented from the state party, is run by a four-member staff and bolstered by more than 20 volunteers.

The vice president already has the support of virtually all of Nevada's top party leaders. Reid also said Gore has sewn up all but about 30 of the party's 800 national "super delegates" who can vote for the candidate of their choice. The vice president also has the endorsement of national organized labor groups, which ought to serve him well at the caucus.

Former Gov. Bob Miller, a Gore supporter, said the vice president would be the best candidate for Nevada because he has pledged to protect the state's interests in its fight against a proposal to ship high-level nuclear waste to Yucca Mountain, 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas.

Miller said Gore also would protect Nevada's gaming interests because he believes in states' rights.

"He's been historically referred to as the third senator from Nevada," Miller said. "He has an extremely close relationship with Sen. Harry Reid. That can hopefully benefit Nevada. We have a healthy, vibrant economy and he was part of the team that brought that about.

"We've had friends in the White House for eight years. I see no reason to change."

Bradley's home state includes Atlantic City's casinos, so he is likely to be sympathetic to Nevada's gaming industry.

As a senator he supported unsuccessful legislation to ship hazardous waste from New Jersey to Nevada. But in 1996, Bradley's last year in the Senate, he voted against a bill that would have established a temporary nuclear waste dump at the Nevada Test Site, 65 miles northwest of Las Vegas.

Bradley also raised concerns about the safety of U.S. Forest Service workers in rural Nevada after attending a 1993 congressional field hearing in Reno on water issues. He said he was disturbed that federal workers avoided driving the government's lime green trucks because they didn't want to be targets of sabotage.

Unlike Gore, however, Bradley has virtually no field presence in Nevada. He also has the endorsement of only one Nevada elected official, maverick state Sen. Joe Neal, D-North Las Vegas. Bradley's campaign efforts in the state consist primarily of an Internet website he is using to recruit people to run "community headquarters."

One such individual, Reno attorney Charles Hartman, conceded that a lot of people he has spoken with indicated they were voting for Gore "because they think he'll win."

"When I first started supporting Bradley it was more an anti-Gore reaction," Hartman said. "Bradley sounds more liberal than Gore does. I don't think Bradley has changed his views all that much, whereas Gore has changed his views a lot. Gore is a fairly conservative guy and Bradley is liberal, and I'd rather go with the liberal."

Among Republican candidates, Texas Gov. George W. Bush enjoys the most support from top Nevada GOP leaders. Gov. Kenny Guinn is his state chairman. Las Vegas media consultant Sig Rogich, his close friend, is also his state finance chairman. Other backers include Lt. Gov. Lorraine Hunt and Rep. Jim Gibbons, R-Nev.

Bush will be pressed in Nevada to clarify his position on the nuclear waste issue. It has been reported that one of his top advisers is Tom Kuhn, president of Edison Electric Institute, an electric power lobbyist who advocates Yucca Mountain as a nuclear waste repository.

But Rogich said Bush will support a nuclear waste repository based only on "safe science," not politics. Rogich said that position is similar to the one held by President Clinton, who has also threatened to veto any proposed temporary nuclear waste dump in Nevada.

Bush also has made critical comments about the spread of gaming, but Rogich said this is actually a good position for Nevadans that would protect the state's dominant industry at home.

"He has certainly been a great governor for Texas and shares a lot of the same philosophies we have here in Nevada, such as less government intrusion in our lives," Rogich said. "He has always had a philosophy that emphasizes his belief in states' rights.

"He's not against the gaming industry. He's against the proliferation of the industry on every street corner. As a resident of Nevada you have to like that. It's nice to have a president who says, 'Leave gaming where it is.' "

Sen. John McCain of Arizona, Bush's chief GOP rival, has voted in the past with the vast majority of his Senate Republican colleagues on unsuccessful bills to ship nuclear waste to a temporary Nevada dump. His state campaign coordinator, Tony Gould of Reno, did not return calls for comment.

McCain, who has played craps in Las Vegas, is a staunch supporter of Indian gaming. He attended a fund-raiser in his honor last year at the MGM Grand that was hosted by the hotel's political action committee. But he has incurred the wrath of the gaming industry lately by co-sponsoring a bill to ban college sports betting in Nevada. He also announced his intent to investigate cartoon-themed slot machines, arguing that they could attract minors.

The senator also has taken a lead role in boxing safety legislation and has advocated severe restrictions on air tour flights over the Grand Canyon and other national parks.

"People have the right to enjoy the park experience without it resembling McCarran Airport," McCain said in 1997.

McCain also was the first prominent Republican from outside Nevada to attend a fund-raiser for John Ensign when the former GOP congressman won the first of his two House terms in 1994. Ensign is now the leading candidate this year for the seat being vacated by Sen. Richard Bryan, D-Nev.

Mike Keeney, a Reno machine shop manager, remains state coordinator of Alan Keyes' presidential campaign even though the GOP activist has been written off by the national media. Keeney conceded he did not know how Keyes stood on nuclear waste and gaming issues.

"The thing that endeared me to Dr. Keyes was listening to him speak," Keeney said. "We need a constitutionalist. I like his position on taxes. He wants to get rid of income taxes and replace them with sales taxes and tariffs. He wants to return education back to the communities."

Clark County Democrats will hold their precinct meetings at 2 p.m. March 12 in the Valley High School gymnasium at 2839 Burnham Ave. Participants will sit at tables by precinct to select delegates to the April 15 county convention at the New Frontier hotel-casino and provide input into their party's platform.

For a delegate to represent either Gore or Bradley, a majority vote by their precinct is required. If only one person shows up representing a particular precinct, he can automatically go to the county convention representing the presidential candidate of his choice.

The county convention will select delegates to the state convention, which will be held at Caesars Palace May 19-21. The state convention, the final step of the three-tier delegate selection process, is where Nevada Democrats will select the delegation that goes to the Democratic National Convention in Los Angeles Aug. 14-17.

Seventeen delegates pledged to a specific candidate and four alternates will be sent to Los Angeles as a result of the caucus process. Three more pledged delegates selected by the state convention and made up of party leaders or elected officials will also go to the national convention.

Those 20 delegates, who must vote as pledged only on the first ballot at the national convention, will be joined by nine super delegates who can vote for the candidate of their choice. Those delegates will include Sens. Reid and Bryan, Rep. Shelley Berkley, former Rep. James Bilbray, Clark County Commissioner Yvonne Atkinson Gates and former Las Vegas Mayor Jan Laverty Jones, who are Democratic National Committee members, Rory Reid and Carol Cox, the state party's first vice chairwoman.

Nevada's 29-vote delegation will make up slightly more than 1 percent of the 2,169 votes needed for a presidential candidate to win the Democratic nomination.

"Anybody who is interested in the political process should be honored to be a member of a national convention," Rory Reid said. "If you don't attend the caucus, you can't be a member of the national delegation and you would have no input into the platform."

The Republican caucus process includes a county convention April 21-22 at the Tropicana hotel-casino and state convention at the Ormsby House in Carson City May 25-27 to select delegates and determine platform issues.

There may be a nonbinding presidential straw poll at the GOP county convention, the Republican Party's Erwin said. But none of the state's 17 delegates and 17 alternates to the national GOP convention will be pledged to a candidate. The state GOP also doesn't guarantee spots for their party leaders in the delegation.

But Erwin said he would be surprised if the delegation didn't include Guinn, Gibbons, state Republican Party Chairman John Mason, and Republican National Committee members Tom Wiesner and former Rep. Barbara Vucanovich. The state's 17 voting delegates will make up slightly more than 1 percent of the 1,034 delegates needed to win the GOP nomination.

"I believe that by the time our state convention is held Bush or McCain will be through the forest and have a clear lead," Erwin said.

Steve Kanigher is a staff writer for the Sun. He can be reached at (702)-259-4075 or by e-mail at steve@lasvegassun.com.

archive