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(This aired last night on "Ralston Live." Sorry, no video available.) Gary Gray wasn’t the kind of guy to brag about how many campaign he won. But in the last 30 years, he may have won more races than any other consultant in the state. Gray died Thursday at the age of 69 in a car accident. But it was no accident that his talents were sought after by candidates at every level – from local officials to lawmakers to governors. He was, quite simply, a man ahead of his time. In the mid-1980s, Gray...
The state group trying to legalize marijuana has divorced itself from a national organization, which has set up a separate PAC in Nevada. The split between the Coalition to Regulate Marijuana Like Alcohol and the Marijuana Policy Project began last November when the former filed a cease and desist order against the latter. (See below.) Then, earlier this year, MPP formed a separate PAC (with a similar name) from the Nevada coalition with the secretary of state. (Attached here.) The schism has...
UPDATED: I have obtained the amendment being floated by Switch to dramatically change the statute under which ratepayers can leave the NV Energy grid, making it much easier and cheaper. I have attached it here. In a move that could dramatically affect power rates in Nevada, three major casino companies recently filed applications to exit the state's utility monopoly, following in the footsteps of data giant Switch. Switch filed its application last November, but Wynn Resorts, MGM Resorts and...
Assemblyman Derek Armstrong, the sponsor of the GOP tax bill that relies on the payroll tax, insisted during Tuesday's hearing that his plan was the friendliest to small businesses. Every lawmaker on the Tax Committee seemed to declare himself or herself a member of the Small Business Lobby. Advocates for truckers, auto dealers, manufacturers and retailers testified they liked the bill better than Gov. Brian Sandoval's plan to change the flat Business License Fee to a graduated Business License...
Worried that Councilman Stavros Anthony was giving Her Honor a real race, Mayor Carolyn Goodman's team hired targeting expert Billy Rogers, who produced devastating mailers that may have turned the tide. The race is nonpartisan. But it became partisan. With Anthony appealing to his GOP base, with the help of colleague, Bob Beers, a fellow stadium skeptic, Rogers, who ironically helped the GOP take the state Senate, returned to his Democratic roots. Team Goodman turned the tables on Anthony,...
When the Assembly tax bill is heard Tuesday, members of the Just Say No to Taxes Every Session Caucus will testify for the measure, thus showing true consensus growing around Gov. Brian Sandoval's budget number of $7.3 billion. What I call the AA bill -- named after sponsor Derek Armstrong and Majority Leader Paul Anderson, who supports it -- will be heard in Assembly Taxation on Tuesday afternoon and among those who will testify in favor are truckers' lobbyist Paul Enos and perhaps those of...
Michael McDonald is the chairman of the Nevada Republican Party. Republican lawmakers are trying to pass tort reform now that they control both houses. And Michael McDonald has been hired by perhaps the state's best-known lawyer as tort reform bills are pending. Yes, this is Nevada. McDonald recently registered for Glenn Lerner, the attorney who constantly advertises on TV, and trial lawyer sources say the GOP chair has solicited other members of the trade group to ask for payment in return for...
Early voting is over, only 9 percent of voters have cast ballots in the Las Vegas mayor's race, so Carolyn Goodman is bringing in her not-so-secret weapon: Oscar Goodman. In a new piece, the former mayor goes after Councilman Stavros Anthony as being essentially a mute when King Oscar was there and of uttering "lies and hypocrisy" as he tries to take the Goodman family seat. Oh, and he calls him "an empty suit." I have been saying for weeks that this kind of campaign going after Anthony...
Now that CNN's Dana Bash has found Harry Reid to be unrepentant about his Mitt Romney tax lies, it's finally time to publish a column I wrote contemporaneously with the Nevada senator's McCarthy-like tactic during the 2012 campaign. The column was never published because Las Vegas Sun Editor Brian Greenspun attempted to protect his friend, Reid, from the criticism. I never wrote for the Sun again. ---- After Republican U.S. Senate candidate Jim Santini announced his candidacy in 1986, a...

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