Giuliani hopes Las Vegas stop will translate to cash - later

Michael J. Mishak, Las Vegas Sun

Thursday, Nov. 8, 2007 | 6:52 a.m.

The Venetian will again be the center of Nevada's Republican universe today.

Rudy Giuliani accepted an invitation from some of the state's well-heeled GOP donors to address the annual dinner meeting of their conservative political action committee.

He's not expecting any contributions from the organization itself. Money made off the dinner - tickets are going for $150, tables for $2,500 - will stay with the sponsoring Keystone Corp., which funds pro-business candidates for the state Assembly and Senate.

The dinner is the only apparent reason Giuliani is flying into town - he has no other campaign events scheduled here this week - but he still hopes it's worth it.

For Giuliani, money is a priority, and tonight he'll be trolling.

Although he leads in national polls, he trails the deep-pocketed former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney in the early voting states of Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina. Also, Giuliani is being overtaken by former Sen . and "Law & Order" star Fred Thompson in South Carolina and, in some polls, by former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee in Iowa.

Giuliani's campaign, while competing in those states, is banking on big wins elsewhere, notably in the delegate-rich - albeit expensive - states that vote later, including Florida and California.

To be sure, Giuliani is benefiting from the Republican Party's identity crisis, with its socially conservative base split on picking a candidate. Still, his vulnerabilities on social issues persist. For instance, Giuliani's support of abortion rights led a coalition of prominent Christian conservatives last month to threaten to back a third-party candidate if Giuliani were to win the party's nomination.

The support of televangelist Pat Robertson, who endorsed Giuliani on Wednesday, could help reassure that crucial voting bloc, but questions remain about his past support for gun control, his divorce- strewed past and his backing of disgraced former New York Police Commissioner Bernard Kerik, who is now under a federal investigation into his alleged acceptance of free renovations from a construction company suspected of having links to organized crime while he was working for Giuliani .

As for money, although the Keystone event is not a campaign fundraiser, the group's meeting is an opportunity for Giuliani to address an influential group of Republican donors in Nevada. The dinner's honoree is Las Vegas Sands President and Chief Operating Officer Bill Weidner. Its keynote speaker is Gov. Jim Gibbons.

Monte Miller, Keystone's treasurer, said that although the group gives money only to Nevada legislators, its roughly 100 members, who pay $1,000 each in annual membership dues, would likely be active as individuals in the presidential race. The Keystone PAC contributed a combined total of $150,000 to Nevada candidates in the 2004 and 2006 election cycles.

"We help candidates who support our idea of a friendly business environment, which means, quite frankly, keeping taxes where they are," Miller said. "For the most part, that's meant Republican legislators."

Critical to Keystone's members in 2008, he said, is maintaining the Bush tax cuts.

The group extended invitations to Thompson and Romney as well, Miller said, but they didn't respond.

What about Republican Sen. John McCain? "We were going to go to him if any of the others didn't solidify."

The Nevada Republican Party had hoped that moving its caucuses to Jan. 19, making them among the earliest in the nation, would garner attention from candidates and thrust Nevada issues onto the national agenda. But so far, Republican candidates have dipped into the state mostly to pick up cash, not court voters.

A big distraction is South Carolina Republicans, who have scheduled their decisive primary to coincide with the Nevada caucuses. Since 1980, the winner of South Carolina's Republican primary has gone on to clinch the party's nomination.