This new lawmaker is a law breaker
On his campaign website, Nevada Assemblyman-elect John Moore dresses sharp and looks like a man who’s ready to conquer Carson City as a conservative representative of the residents of District 8.
Moore appears somewhat less confident on his wanted poster.
That’s right. The lawmaker is a lawbreaker.
Despite spending almost nothing on his campaign, and having an active warrant for his arrest at the Las Vegas City Marshal’s Office for traffic offenses, Moore surfed a Republican wave Nov. 4 and narrowly defeated extremely well-funded incumbent Democrat Jason Frierson.
In fact, it appears the $792 warrant after pleading no contest for having no proof of insurance is only slightly less than Moore raised during his campaign.
Although it’s not the first time he has made the police blotter, Moore’s legal entanglement is no major scandal. And he wouldn’t be the first legislator with a history of run-ins with the law.
But Moore’s success on Election Day is instructive of what really happened in Campaign 2014. He wasn’t some GOP secret weapon who benefited by a stealthy strategy and access to Republican money-bags donors. A former U.S. Army Ranger with a mixed work history, he was a throw-in candidate in a heavily Democratic district that Frierson previously had won.
Word is Moore had second thoughts about entering the race, and even after he defeated the incumbent by 40 votes — 4,287 to 4,247 — he wasn’t all that confident he wanted to go to the Legislature.
Who could blame him for thinking it might be bad for his reputation?
Neither party wins any points for vetting candidates. Moore’s troubles were easy to find. Frankly, it’s Frierson who deserves to be embarrassed for putting on what ranks as one of the weakest campaigns in recent Nevada political history.
How awful was it?
Frierson was first elected to the Assembly in 2010 and was re-elected in 2012 after easily defeating Moore in the Democratic primary. (In fact, as of Friday, Moore was still listed as a Democrat on the Secretary of State’s website.)
At a time he ought to have been leaving nothing to chance, Frierson appears to have spent much of the 2014 campaign writing checks to consultants and other candidates, according to his October contributions and expenses report on file with the Secretary of State. As of the fourth reporting deadline, he had raked in approximately $288,000 in cash and in-kind contributions from a variety of the traditional donors.
His campaign wrote checks for more than $25,000 to The Pivot Group of Washington, D.C., in October. And he sent $15,000 to the State Democratic Party and $20,000 to the Nevada First PAC.
Frierson appears to have spent more on the judicial candidacy of William Horne, $1,500, than Moore spent on his whole campaign.
Moore, meanwhile, collected no contributions — zero — through his first three campaign reports. By the fourth report, he managed to collect $800 — $500 of that from Republican Assemblyman John Hambrick’s campaign.
That’s it.
This would tend to dispel the rumor that the masterminds inside the Republican Party had all their bases covered and benefited from a brilliant strategy to defeat the Democrats.
Repeated attempts to reach Moore were unsuccessful. But on Wednesday, during a freshman orientation session in Carson City, Moore told the Review-Journal, “We have a great opportunity here to do some great things for the folks of our great state. I’m just looking forward to it.”
Good for him.
Who knows, maybe Moore will surprise us and, in keeping with his Ranger training, prove a tenacious representative of Nevada taxpayers. It’s as likely he’ll show he’s in over his head like most of his fellow freshman legislators.
John Moore’s $800 gamble paid off, but I think maybe it’s time he cleared that city warrant and paid his fine.
It’s hard to serve in the Legislature from behind bars — even in Nevada.
John L. Smith’s column appears Sunday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Friday and Saturday. Email him at Smith@reviewjournal.com or call 702-383-0295. Follow him on Twitter @jlnevadasmith.
