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Report projects 420,000 fewer Nevadans to vote in 2018

Nearly 420,000 Nevadans could skip next year’s midterm elections, and Democrats and Republicans alike are prepping for what such a decrease in voters could mean in 2018.

Democrats want to avoid a repeat of 2014, when a weak ballot and low turnout saw the GOP take control of state politics for the first time in decades. Republicans see a potential drop nearly equal to Nevada’s second-most populous county as an opportunity to pounce once again.

The projected dip in turnout comes from a report from The Voter Participation Center, a nonprofit that advocates for more voting access and easier registration. About three-quarters of those — approximately 310,000 voters — are expected to be unmarried women, millennials and minority groups.

“That favors the Republicans,” said Eric Herzik, who heads the political science department at the University of Nevada, Reno. “The people who aren’t going to show up are going to be disproportionately Democrat.”

Midterm shift

In 2016, nearly 50,000 more Democrats than Republicans voted in Nevada, where the open U.S. Senate seat, three House seats and both chambers of the Nevada Legislature were won by blue candidates.

Democrats will need to avoid the missteps of 2014 to have any hope of retaking the governor’s mansion, keeping control of the Legislature or taking the second U.S. Senate seat.

One of the biggest issues for Nevada Democrats that year, Herzik said, was a lack of talent at the top of the ballot.

“None of these candidates” received the most votes in the Democratic primary, beating the technical winner Robert Goodman by nearly 4,000 votes.

Republican Gov. Brian Sandoval’s high approval rating prompted big-name Democrats to stay away, and Sandoval beat Goodman by 47 points to win re-election.

That lack of enthusiasm trickled down the ballot. Democrats held a voter registration advantage of 60,000, but party turnout was 42 percent compared with the GOP’s 58 percent. Republicans swept the congressional races and, for the first time since the 1980s, won control of both houses of the Nevada Legislature.

If Democrats want to avoid a repeat of 2014, Herzik said, “they’ve got to energize their base. And their base is often less connected to voting than the Republicans.”

Herzik said he expects Democrats to have “quality candidates for all the offices” for a 2018 election that is already beginning to take shape. U.S. Rep. Jacky Rosen, who’s running to unseat incumbent GOP U.S. Sen. Dean Heller, and Clark County Commission Chairman Steve Sisolak, who is taking his near $4 million campaign war chest to the governor’s race, have announced their intentions for next year.

Outreach vs. backlash

Newly elected Clark County GOP Chairman Carl Bunce said Republicans must focus on registering new voters to give his party any chance of replicating the 2014 election.

That starts with going into districts that have been historically dominated by Democrats at the state Senate and Assembly levels, he said. While those races might never go red, Bunce added, additional Republicans will help with statewide races, such as governor.

“We just need to start doing work in the community, which frankly hasn’t been done in Clark County in quite a few years,” Bunce said. “We need to not give up on districts we think are lost.”

Democrats, meanwhile, expect voter blowback against President Donald Trump and are counting on that to help mobilize the base in 2018.

“I think there’s going to be real backlash against Trump in this state,” said Alana Mounce, who was hired this month as the executive director of the Nevada State Democratic Party.

Mounce said that with a strong group of candidates and angst about Trump, Democrats are confident going into 2018 despite midterm struggles of the past.

“We have incredible candidates this cycle who we’re ready to talk about,” she said. “We know exactly who we need to talk to and how to be successful.”

Contact Colton Lochhead at clochhead@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-4638. Follow @ColtonLochhead on Twitter.

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