Elections

A decorated Air Force combat veteran who lined up support from the Trump wing of the Republican Party will face a Democratic incumbent in a tossup congressional race in Nevada.The Republican candidate, Sam Peters, won a three-way primary in Nevada’s Fourth District. The seat has been held by Steven Horsford, a Democrat, for the past two terms as well as a single term a decade ago.Mr. Peters, 47, defeated Annie Black, The Associated Press said Wednesday. Ms. Black is an assemblywoman who attended the Jan. 6, 2021, rally for Mr. Trump in Washington and was censured by state lawmakers for refusing to wear a mask. Chance Bonaventura, a Republican campaign operative who is chief of staff for a Las Vegas city councilwoman, finished third in Tuesday’s primary.Extending from the northern part of Las Vegas through central Nevada, the sprawling district is larger in land area than 17 states. While Democrats maintain a more than 10-point voter registration advantage in the district, both national parties are investing heavily in the Las Vegas media market, and the race is rated as a tossup by the Cook Political Report.Endorsed by the Nevada Republican Party in May, Mr. Peters had played up the support of several leading figures in the party’s Trump wing, including Representatives Paul Gosar and Andy Biggs, who are both from Arizona.The two congressmen have been the subject of unsuccessful efforts to disqualify them from running for re-election by Mr. Trump’s critics, who say that they fomented election falsehoods that escalated into the deadly Jan. 6, 2021, attack at the Capitol.Mr. Peters, who earned a Bronze Star for his service during the war in Afghanistan, has also promulgated Mr. Trump’s falsehoods about the 2020 election and last year called on Nevada’s Republican secretary of state to abandon the use of electronic voting machines for the 2022 election.Making his second run for Congress — two years ago he was the runner-up in the Republican primary — Mr. Peters had vowed to support the completion of a southern border wall that became a cause célèbre for Mr. Trump.Since the Fourth District’s creation a decade ago, Republicans have won the seat just once, holding it for a single term. The party is seeking to seize upon the sagging approval numbers of President Biden and lingering attention on the personal issues of Mr. Horsford, who has acknowledged having an extramarital affair.The details came to light after a woman who had been an intern for Harry M. Reid, the former longtime Nevada senator who died last year, revealed in 2020 to The Las Vegas Review-Journal that she was the woman in a podcast titled “Mistress for Congress” that referred to the affair.In March, Mr. Peters said that Mr. Horsford, who did not have a primary opponent, should not run for re-election. More

Mark Robertson, an Army veteran and business owner, has clinched the Republican nomination for a House seat in Nevada with a large campaign war chest and a message centered on protecting freedom of speech and pushing back against government mandates.Mr. Robertson will face the Democratic incumbent, Representative Dina Titus, 72, in the general election in November in a race that reflects national Democrats’ struggles over the economy amid the coronavirus crisis.The Associated Press called the race for Mr. Robertson on Wednesday, a day after voters chose from a crowded field of Republicans hoping to unseat Ms. Titus.Ms. Titus, who is in her sixth term, has for years easily claimed victory with the support of working-class voters and Latinos. But Republicans have a higher chance of success this fall after her district, which includes the urban center of Las Vegas, was redrawn to add more Republican voters by taking in larger portions of Henderson and Boulder City in Clark County.Ms. Titus has also been facing stronger political headwinds because her tourist-heavy district has been hit hard by the pandemic. High unemployment along with rising gasoline and food prices have made her vulnerable to attacks from Republicans on crime, jobs and inflation.The seat will be hotly contested: The National Republican Campaign Committee has added Ms. Titus to its target list of vulnerable Democrats, and Ms. Titus failed to get the ambassadorship she sought from the Biden administration because Democrats could not risk losing her seat.Mr. Robertson, who served in the military for 30 years, touted himself as a fiscal conservative determined to fight mandates on education and health care. More

Man who took part in Capitol riot was given tour of building by Republican on January 5Video evidence shows tourists taking photos of security checkpoints and contradicts Barry Loudermilk’s previous denial he led a tour02:50About 24 hours before the January 6 Capitol attack, a Republican member of Congress, Barry Loudermilk, led an unofficial tour through the House office buildings, passing by the security checkpoints located at the entrances to the tunnels leading towards the Capitol building.The tour included a man who took photos of the tunnel entrances and the US Capitol police checkpoints, and then joined thousands of Donald Trump supporters the following day to march on the Capitol from the rally on the Ellipse.That person’s activity was captured on security cameras and turned over to the House select committee investigating the insurrection at the Capitol. The panel made the footage publicly available on Wednesday in a letter demanding cooperation in its inquiry from Loudermilk.The footage showing the man, and others, stopping to photograph the tunnels and checkpoints bolsters the allegation from Democrats that the tour amounted to a reconnaissance event in preparation for the Capitol attack.It also cast doubt on Loudermilk’s previous denials that he led a tour connected in any way to January 6. Loudermilk first denied he led a tour, then said he gave a tour only to families with young children, then said he gave a tour to about 16 people.The video evidence additionally challenged a recent letter from the US Capitol police chief, Tom Manger, who informed Loudermilk that “we train our officers on being alert for people conducting surveillance … we do not consider any of the activities we observed as suspicious.”The tour was also notable because officially, tours were banned at the time due to Covid measures. The only people in the Capitol that day should have been members of Congress and staff, reporters, US Capitol police and official business visitors.But members of Congress tend to bend rules as they see fit. For instance, two sources familiar with the matter said, a member wanting to give a tour could have given one name to the appointments desk and have an entire group let in.The Loudermilk tour was cleared into a House office building by a staffer, the select committee said in the letter. The group would probably have been registered as an official visit to Loudermilk’s office but took the “scenic” route on the way in or out, the sources said.The sources spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss how the group might have been authorized to be in the complex. They added it was possible the names of the entire group were never recorded, but if they were, it would be in the possession of the House sergeant at arms.Member-led tours – including to the Capitol dome, which then congresswoman-elect Lauren Boebert managed on 12 December 2020 – have since returned to the Capitol, though the procedure is more stringent and visitors must be submitted and vetted in advance.According to the select committee, Loudermilk led an hours-long tour for approximately 10 people around the Rayburn, Cannon and Longworth House office buildings, as well as the tunnels leading from Rayburn and Longworth to the Capitol building itself.“Individuals on the tour photographed and recorded areas of the complex not typically of interest to tourists,” the panel’s chairman, Bennie Thompson, wrote in the letter to Loudermilk. “The January 5, 2021 tour raises concerns about their activity and intent.”The man who took photos of the tunnels travelled to Washington on 4 January 2021, appearing to depart Georgia in the early morning on one of several “Keep America Great” coaches. It made a short stop in South Carolina before continuing to Washington.He then toured the House office buildings the following day as part of Loudermilk’s group, recording himself in the basement rotunda of Cannon around 1pm on 5 January 2021, according to a Facebook live video he posted.The select committee added that it had learned that some of the people on Loudermilk’s tour attended the Save America rally that took place on the Ellipse on the morning of January 6, where Trump spoke and urged his supporters to march to the Capitol.Citing additional video clips obtained in its investigation, the panel said the man that took a photograph of a staircase in Longworth, located next to a hallway leading to one of the tunnels, joined the march to the Capitol and threatened members of Congress.“There’s no escape Pelosi, Schumer, Nadler,” the man said as the Capitol was being breached, the video shows. “They’re coming in, coming in like white on rice for Pelosi, Nadler, even you, AOC. We’re coming to take you out and pull you out by your hairs.”The select committee had previously requested voluntary cooperation from Loudermilk last month, which he flatly refused as he denied any wrongdoing. The latest request came with screenshots of the tour group taking photos of secure areas inserted in the letter.TopicsUS Capitol attackJan 6 hearingsRepublicansHouse of RepresentativesnewsReuse this content More

Joseph Lombardo, the sheriff who oversees the Las Vegas area and was endorsed by former President Donald J. Trump, has won Nevada’s Republican primary for governor.The Associated Press declared Mr. Lombardo the winner early Wednesday over a field that included four other major candidates for the right to challenge Gov. Steve Sisolak, a Democrat, in the general election.The November election is expected to be one of the tightest governor’s races in the country. Nevada’s political environment is highly favorable to Republicans because of unified Democratic control of the state amid a series of tough economic indicators, with the costs of rent and gasoline increasing at among the fastest rates in the country.Mr. Lombardo, who as the sheriff of Clark County became known nationally for overseeing the response to the 2017 mass shooting in Las Vegas that killed 60 people at a concert, had established himself as the race’s polling leader by the time Mr. Trump endorsed him in late April, giving the sheriff his boilerplate seal of approval on taxes, abortion, gun rights and election issues.Mr. Lombardo has since highlighted his endorsement from the former president across his television and digital advertising.Mr. Lombardo defeated former Senator Dean Heller, who waffled on his support for Mr. Trump before his failed 2018 re-election campaign; Joey Gilbert, a Reno lawyer and former professional boxer who was endorsed by the Nevada Republican Party; Mayor John Lee of North Las Vegas; Guy Nohra, a Lebanese-born venture capitalist; and Fred Simon, a physician.Such was Mr. Lombardo’s advantage after the Trump endorsement that during a televised debate last month, he declared the primary contest over and asked his Republican rivals to “come together” behind him to defeat Mr. Sisolak. More

Jennifer Medina, Reporting from Los Angeles.
12:49 AM ET More

Jennifer Medina, Reporting from Los Angeles.
12:49 AM ET More

Jennifer Medina, Reporting from Los Angeles.
12:49 AM ET More

Jennifer Medina, Reporting from Los Angeles.
12:49 AM ET More