Democrats toil to keep their majority in state Senate

Anjeanette Damon

Sunday, June 6, 2010 | 2 a.m.

Joyce Woodhouse

Barbara Cegavske

Sen. Dennis Nolan

Nevada Senate Democrats are fighting to hold their slim majority.

In the 2008 Democratic wave, the party captured two seats from Republicans, giving it a 12-9 majority and control of the state Senate for the first time in 18 years.

But this year isn’t shaping up to be friendly to Democrats or incumbents.

The caucus, however, has carefully recruited candidates to run for open seats and in competitive districts. It is also putting resources behind a potentially vulnerable freshman, Sen. Joyce Woodhouse, D-Las Vegas.

Senate Majority Leader Steven Horsford, D-North Las Vegas, said in a recent interview he is confident Tuesday’s primary won’t disrupt the caucus’s carefully laid plans. And it might provide an opportunity or two for his party.

Only one of his recruited candidates faces a significant primary opponent. Attorney Tammy Peterson has the caucus’s backing in her challenge to Sen. Barbara Cegavske, R-Las Vegas. Democrats think the race provides their best shot at capturing another seat.

Peterson, though, has been aggressively opposed by businessman Mark Brandon.

The caucus has stayed out of the ugliest primary on the Democratic ticket: the battle between Assemblyman Mark Manendo and Assemblywoman Kathy McClain, both Las Vegas Democrats, for the seat of outgoing Sen. Terry Care.

The best opportunity for Senate Democrats on Tuesday is actually a Republican primary.

News broke last week that Sen. Dennis Nolan, R-Las Vegas, left a voice mail offering money to the sister of a rape victim if she told the truth about what happened. Nolan is a friend of the man imprisoned for the rape.

Nolan told the Associated Press that he was simply trying to get the woman to admit the sex had been consensual. But the scandal could weaken Nolan enough to give the edge to his conservative challenger Elizabeth Halseth.

If that happens, Democrats are confident they can marginalize Halseth and pull off a victory in that district.

It’s a strategy some Democrats hoped the caucus would employ in the district being vacated by Sen. Randolph Townsend, R-Reno.

Conservative Assemblyman Ty Cobb, R-Reno, is running against more moderate first-time candidate Ben Kieckhefer, who has the backing of Senate Republicans. Most expect Cobb to pull off a victory in the Republican primary.

Some Democrats wanted the caucus to support a strong candidate to run against Cobb, on the hope he would be too conservative for a district that has long supported the moderate Townsend.

But Horsford said the strategy didn’t make sense in the mostly Republican district.

The closers

Major candidates in the U.S. Senate and gubernatorial races unleashed their “closing” ads last week.

Sam Morris

Sue Lowden

Republican Senate candidate Sue Lowden, who has dropped in the polls after several campaign stumbles, is running a positive ad focused on her biography and positioning her as a fighter for the common voter.

Lowden’s opponent Sharron Angle is focusing on the conservative fight.

And in the gubernatorial race, Republican Brian Sandoval appears to be skipping the primary almost entirely with an ad mentioning GOP opponent Jim Gibbons, but focusing heavily on Democrat Rory Reid, his likely general election opponent.

Anjeanette Damon is the Reno Gazette-Journal’s political reporter and writes the “Inside Nevada Politics” blog, which appears at rgj.com/inp.