Vice presidential candidate and Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz campaigned in Las Vegas ahead of the presidential debate on Tuesday.

Walz arrived in Las Vegas on Monday evening and made a stop Tuesday morning at the Park Towers at Hughes Center for a fundraiser, where he said Vice President Kamala Harris will show the American people that she’s ready to be president at the debate Tuesday night.

“Let’s just all be very clear, this is the most qualified person who’s ready to do this job,” Walz said. “I think all of you tonight will get an opportunity to see that.”

Coming from a stop in Reno where wildfires are raging in the Washoe Valley, Walz said there is a sense of neighborliness that comes through in Nevada as firefighters work to combat the fire.

“Those folks up there were serving their neighbors,” Walz said.

Democratic Party operatives turned what was going to be a rally into a collection point for people to bring in things for those who have been displaced, he said. Helping people is “why you do this work,” he said.

“It’s a challenge. Folks are out of their homes, some folks have lost everything they had. Those are things that we work together to get done,” Walz said.

Harris’ running mate also highlighted the need for getting out the vote and that the margin between the two candidates is razor thin. He said the last election was won with about 40,000 votes spread over some battleground states, including Nevada.

“We know, if we win here, the path for Donald Trump becomes much, much more difficult,” Walz said. “The same goes for Georgia and North Carolina. These are pivotal states.”

Polls have shown Harris and Trump are neck-in-neck, but that Harris has lost some momentum from the initial boost of voter enthusiasm when she launched her campaign this summer. Walz called for the need to take that momentum and use the campaign resources to transfer the momentum into voter contact.

Walz also repeated the main talking points of the Democratic party about what is at stake in the election, highlighting the need for affordable housing and the need to protect abortion care.

“When do you get to be in a state where a small number of votes and the work that the folks in this room are doing could make the difference between what we don’t even want to imagine with Donald Trump getting back into the White House.”

This is a developing story. Check back for updates.

Contact Jessica Hill at jehill@reviewjournal.com. Follow @jess_hillyeah on X.

RENO, Nev. (KOLO) – Minnesota Governor Tim Walz arrived in Reno about an hour off schedule.

This is his first visit to Northern Nevada as Kamala Harris’s running mate.

Washoe County is the purple county in the purple state of Nevada, in his limited time here he needed to make a solid impression.

His first stop, Washoe County Democratic Headquarters.

Standing room only here to see the Governor; but at the front of the room something different.

Organizers here had put the word out to bring items for those impacted by the Davis Fire. Within a matter of hours water, baby items, and snacks came pouring into the office on Terminal Way.

Walz told the group, this is what community is all about, helping neighbors in times of need.

“Turning this office into… that is what it is all about,” Governor Walz told the group. “Campaigns and politics are a means to the end. The end is a better, fairer society where all of us take care of one another.”

Initially his visit here in Reno was to take on a much different tone.

A rally was scheduled at the Grand Serra Resort on Monday afternoon. But in light of the fire which has impacted thousands of northern Nevadans, it just didn’t seem appropriate.

And Walz was ready with a message that fit the situation at hand.

“To make sure we have the ability show that value; the ability to collectively work together. The idea there is value in that,” said Walz.

He spent only a few minutes here with party faithful.

His next stop was to firefighters who are helping put out a fire that has proved formidable to local fire agencies.

For approximately 45-minutes, this is where Walz chose to spend most of his time. As a governor he understands what crews can be up against. He himself has declared state of emergencies.

He talked to as many personnel as he could from firefighter to chief, even being handed a baseball hat and t-shirt.

“I think we are just grateful he came by and showed his support, and it was really important to us,” said Adam Mayberry with Truckee Meadows Fire Protection District. “You know he shared some stories about fires that he has experienced in Minnesota.”

Walz didn’t come empty handed, pizzas were brought in as a thank you from the Democratic Vice-Presidential nominee.

Walz said he would return to the Truckee Meadows, soon.

Hopefully at a time when the community isn’t having to look over its shoulder for the next evacuation order.

Copyright 2024 KOLO. All rights reserved.

A Washoe County probate commissioner has denied attempts to videotape secretive court proceedings in media magnate Rupert Murdoch’s legal battle against his children, as national media outlets attempt to unseal the case.

Murdoch — the 93-year-old businessman behind the media companies that control Fox News, The Wall Street Journal, the New York Post and other outlets in Australia and Britain — has been using a Nevada probate court to seek changes in an irrevocable trust controlling company shares and who will succeed him following his death, the New York Times reported in July.

The case is set to go to trial this month, to determine whether Murdoch is acting in good faith and for the sole benefit of heirs by seeking to change the trust, the New York Times reported. The limited information publicized about the case shows that a series of evidentiary hearings are scheduled to begin on Sept. 16.

Six national media outlets — the New York Times, CNN, The Associated Press, National Public Radio, The Washington Post and Reuters — have joined in an attempt to open proceedings to the public and access the case’s records, according to documents obtained by the Review-Journal.

In August, Probate Commissioner Edmund Gorman Jr. denied a request to videotape the proceedings from Alexander Falconi, the operator of the Our Nevada Judges media website.

The commissioner wrote that electronic coverage of the case would violate the “parties’ rights to privacy which are protected by Nevada Revised Statutes,” according to court documents obtained by the Review-Journal.

Our Nevada Judges has challenged the commissioner’s decision to prevent coverage, prompting responses from attorneys involved in the proceedings who are seeking to prevent public access. Attorneys who authored responses to the challenge do not indicate the names of their clients, and wrote that the court proceedings scheduled for this month should remain closed because they concern a trust.

“The confidential nature of these proceedings is supported by both historical precedent and current legislative intent to protect the privacy and well-being of those involved,” attorneys wrote in a response to Our Nevada Judge’s challenge. “This protection is crucial for maintaining Nevada’s status as a competitive jurisdiction for estate planning and asset protection.”

Multiple attorneys involved in the case did not respond to request for comment on Monday afternoon.

“I will continue to authorize Our Nevada Judges Inc. to participate in litigation confronting efforts by the judiciary and legislature to seal and close our courts without the strict scrutiny analysis mandated by the First Amendment,” Falconi said in an emailed statement. “The sealing of the entire file of the Murdoch trust case is egregiously excessive and an ongoing embarrassment.”

The national media outlets filed a motion last week to unseal the case. Attorney Maggie McLetchie, who is representing the media outlets, wrote that there is a large public interest in the case due to “the potential of this proceeding to determine the direction of a media empire with immense influence over the American political landscape,” according to a copy of the motion.

The only published information about the case includes “general docket information” visible on the Washoe County District Court’s website, which fails to include the names of the parties involved in the court proceedings. A status conference in the case is scheduled for Tuesday and remains closed to the public, District Court Clerk Alicia Lerud said Monday.

“Though some litigants may desire secrecy and some courts indulge this desire, this level of sealing does not pass constitutional muster,” McLetchie wrote in the motion filed on behalf of the media companies, adding that civil proceedings and records should be presumed open to the public under the First Amendment and Nevada’s constitution.

Documents filed by Our Nevada Judges and the coalition of national media outlets both reference a Nevada Supreme Court ruling in a separate case brought by Falconi, in which the high court found that the public has a constitutional right to Family Court proceedings.

McLetchie wrote in the motion that because of the Supreme Court ruling, a judge must give a reason to close a case in civil proceedings.

Attorneys opposing Our Nevada Judge’s efforts to obtain media access wrote that trust proceedings are ruled by a different state law, unrelated to the Supreme Court ruling in the prior case.

“Unlike the family law proceedings at issue in Falconi, the trust proceedings at issue here are deeply rooted in equity and were historically treated as private matters,” the attorneys wrote in court documents.

Murdoch’s trust currently divides control of the family business between his four oldest children — Lachlan, James, Elisabeth and Prudence, the New York Times reported. But Murdoch wants to only allow Lachlan, currently the top executive at Fox Corp. and News Corp., to run the businesses, arguing in court that doing so would preserve conservative editorial standards the companies’ commercial value, according to the Times.

Attorneys for Elisabeth, Prudence and James Murdoch have argued that their father is trying to disenfranchise them, which would violate the spirit of the trust’s “equal governance provision,” the Times reported.

Contact Katelyn Newberg at knewberg@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0240.