Titus officially battling Porter

State Sen. Dina Titus officially entered the race for the 3rd Congressional District on Tuesday, saying she hopes for a clean campaign on the issues as she tries to unseat Republican Rep. Jon Porter.

"This race is not going to be personal," she said. "It's going to be about the record. My record shows I'm going to be a fighter for the district. I've been representing the district for 20 years."

Titus, a 57-year-old political science professor, filed her candidacy at the Clark County Government Center on Tuesday morning.

Two decades ago, her friend Bob Coffin encouraged her to run for the state Senate and offered to pay her filing fee. In keeping with that tradition on Tuesday, Coffin paid the $300 to put her name on the August primary ballot.

Coffin, a Democrat who also is a state senator representing Las Vegas, said Titus is the candidate Democrats have been waiting for to run against Porter, whose previous opponents for the closely divided House of Representatives district have been political novices.

"All we needed was a Democrat with some experience to run," he said. "Three times in a row, we didn't have really somebody with experience and credentials, even though they had promise. You need to be able to fight. You need to have a killer instinct, and Dina Titus has got that."

Titus' career in politics has been conducted on the state level, including an unsuccessful run as the Democratic gubernatorial nominee in 2006.

But Titus said she is ready to deal with federal issues, because she has seen their effect on the state.

Issues such as health care, home foreclosures, military casualties and energy needs all affect the state, Titus said.

Titus said she would push for universal health care as she did in the Legislature, where it was her legislation that created the Nevada Check-up program that provides insurance for children. Covering the uninsured would bring down health care costs and improve quality, she said.

Titus said she would vote to end the war in Iraq and bring the troops home. That, she said, also would free up more money for domestic needs.

"We are spending $5,000 a second in Iraq," she said. "That's money we could spend here, for infrastructure."

Titus accused Porter of being entrenched in Washington politics and out of touch with his home state.

She said the policies of President Bush, supported by Porter, have "failed this country and failed this state" and were to blame for the current state of the economy.

Titus agreed with Porter that high gas prices are a major problem facing local residents, but she said she would not support drilling for oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. However, she said it might be worth exploring Nevada's oil shale resources.

Titus said the real answer to America's energy problems lay in taking away tax breaks for big oil companies and investing in renewable energy infrastructure.

Porter's record of voting with the president has gone from about 90 percent in past years to about 50 percent last year, a shift the congressman insists is not a politically calculated tacking to the center.

Titus said Porter would not be successful if that was what he was trying to do.

"The public's not fooled by that," she said. "His true colors were shown in his years of voting without question for the Bush agenda."

Titus entered the race less than two weeks ago after Robert Daskas, a local prosecutor, dropped out. She said her late entry in the race gave the campaign a sense of urgency and propelled it forward.

"People are excited," she said. "They know we've got to hit the ground running."

The 3rd Congressional District race also has three other Democrats, Barry Michaels, Anna Nevenic and Carlo "Tex" Poliak; a Green Party candidate, Bob Giaquinta; an Independent American Party candidate, Floyd Fitzgibbons; a Libertarian, Joseph P. Silvestri; and an independent candidate, Jeffrey C. Reeves.

The district includes mostly suburban areas of Clark County.

Contact reporter Molly Ball at mball@reviewjournal.com or 702-387-2919.