In Nevada Senate race, Democrats turn to proven message on abortion

“Because of the law that Sam Brown called for, I had to leave Texas to get the care I needed,” Valerie Peterson said in the ad, which is scheduled to air in Nevada on Wednesday morning. “Now I live in Nevada and I can’t see Sam Brown taking away our rights here too.”

As Democrats navigate difficult political and economic terrain in Nevada, some believe their best hope for victory – both in this Senate race and for President Biden’s reelection – is to increase turnout among Democrats and disenchanted independents by convincing them that abortion rights are in danger, even in a state that is among the most pro-abortion rights in the country.

Vice President Harris, second gentleman Doug Emhoff and other Democratic officials have tried to sound the alarm in Nevada about the possibility that the Republican Party’s control of the Senate and the White House could make a national ban on abortion a reality. A coalition of abortion rights groups recently announced it had gathered enough signatures for a Nevada ballot measure to enshrine abortion rights in the state constitution, which Democrats hope , will be another driver of participation.

Brown, a retired Army captain who served in Afghanistan, insists he won’t interfere with Nevada laws allowing abortion up to 24 weeks — protections overwhelmingly supported by voters in a referendum several decades ago. He said he would not vote for a national abortion ban in the Senate if Republicans took control of that chamber. And in a February interview with NBC, he spoke of his empathy for women, including his wife, who have made the difficult decision to terminate a pregnancy.

Rosen rejected his claims, relentlessly arguing that voters should focus on the support he expressed for Texas’ abortion ban in 2013. “Believe his record,” Rosen said. “It’s only getting softer ahead of the November election.”

Brown described Rosen’s statements as an attempt to mislead voters about his position.

“For Democrats to try to scare people around an issue that is so personal and requires empathy requires support — that’s sad to me,” Brown said. “They should rely on a record in favor of the people, but they can’t. »

Interviews with more than two dozen women across Nevada in recent months suggest that Democrats’ biggest challenges will be changing the perception that abortion rights are safe in Nevada and countering many voters’ desire to simply ignore the elections.

While Democrats predicted earlier this year that the Arizona Supreme Court’s decision reinstating a near-total ban on abortion would send shockwaves across the country, Vivian Garcia, 40, was paying no attention to the legal battle in its neighboring state. , she says.

Watching her children play on the lawn of an outdoor mall here, Garcia wondered why Democrats were so obsessed with issues like abortion when, she said, they should explain how they would ease the burden financial “people who work really, really hard”. and pay their taxes.

“It’s like they’re trying to get your attention on something else when they really need to focus,” said Garcia, who works as an assistant manager at a housekeeping company. She supported Biden in 2020 “because we wanted to see something different,” she said. Today, faced with the rising cost of rent, “crazy” interest rates and the price of gasoline, she does not really know which party she will support in the presidential and senatorial elections.

Polls in Nevada show early signs in favor of Democrats, particularly weakening support among Hispanic and younger voters. Biden won the state in 2020, but a New York Times and Siena College poll conducted in late April and early May showed that 38% of registered voters in Nevada said they would support Biden and 50% would support Donald Trump if the presidential race was a two-person race. one-way correspondence.

In the Senate race, Rosen fared better than Biden in the poll – with 40 percent of registered voters saying they would support her and 38 percent saying they would support Brown before he won the nomination . But 23 percent said they didn’t know. Nevada Democratic organizers believe abortion rights will be an important issue for frustrated young voters — particularly women — who aren’t enthusiastic about either candidate at the top of the list, but who would show up if they thought their vote mattered on this issue.

Facing voter dissatisfaction with the economy in 2022, Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto (D-Nev.) mapped out much of the same. strategy Democrats are now employing in the Rosen race. Building on outrage over the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v. Wadeshe remained focused on the issue, ultimately defeating Republican Adam Laxalt in one of the nation’s closest Senate races.

Just as they did in 2022, Democrats are portraying Brown and other Republican candidates in crucial Senate races, including Ohio and Arizona, as extremists. But many voters here said they paid little attention to the attacks.

“It’s bad: the rent, the food, the utilities. You cannot support yourself even with one job; you have to have two,” said Lorena Molina, a 58-year-old Nevadan who is unsure whether she will support Democrats or Republicans in November. Asked about Republican efforts to restrict abortion rights in other states, Molina argued that couples should be more responsible when it comes to contraception and said she would prefer to see her Nevada representatives focus on how to stop landlords from raising rents.

Jennifer Paulson, a Las Vegas pharmacist, said she had little interest in voting this year. But she will vote “if the threats to women’s rights seem real,” she said as she loaded her groceries into her trunk.

“They should stop making suppressing women’s rights a priority,” Paulson said. Although she hasn’t seen clear evidence that Republicans would succeed in passing a national abortion ban in the Senate, “if that were one thing, then yes, I would definitely (vote), it’s on “.

Lindsey Harmon, president of Nevadans for Reproductive Freedom — which collected more than 200,000 signatures to ensure the abortion rights measure made it onto the November ballot — said the group had attracted “a record number of volunteers who wanted to help us collect signatures.

Asked if she’s concerned that some voters in the state aren’t closely following legislative battles over abortion in other states, she said the message is that Nevadans “can’t do anything take for granted “.

“We have statutory protections in the state of Nevada. But I think what we’re learning is that border states – like Idaho, Utah and Arizona – are going to depend on our state to do what’s right, to step up, to protect them and the patients we serve,” Harmon said.

Brown has spoken of leading “compassionately” on this issue and emphasizes that he supports exceptions for rape, incest and risks to a mother’s life and health. When Brown’s wife, Amy, spoke in the NBC interview about her regrets about having an abortion at 24 before they met, she said she didn’t feel judged by her husband. even though he describes himself as “pro-life.”

But the Republican candidate It has been difficult to pin down certain aspects of the abortion debate. He declined, for example, to take a position on whether Arizona’s near-total ban should have been implemented (before that state’s legislature repealed it), stating simply that he is ” pro-life and believes the issue is now rightly left unresolved.” at the state level. »

Asked about his support in 2014 for Texas’ 20-week abortion ban, which did not include exceptions for rape or incest, Brown said there was no inconsistency because his position then reflected what the voters of that state wanted at the time.

Rosen said she was trying to convince Nevada voters that abortion rights are not protected in Nevada “because if Sam Brown wins — or if any of these other (Republican) candidates win — they will impose a 100% nationwide ban.”

“I live here in Las Vegas,” Rosen said. “I’ll bet the house on that.”

Brown said he would maintain protections that Nevada voters approved decades ago.

“I have always believed that this is a problem that needs to be solved by the people at the state level,” Brown said.

Carolyn Rose, a Las Vegas Republican who wants to see the Republican Party take control of the Senate and the White House, said she was relieved that Brown was clear about his position on abortion early in the race.

“Don’t pull punches and act like you’re hiding something,” Rose, 75, said when asked how Republicans could approach the problem more effectively. “Say it, then get it over with and move on.”