Nevada

Sam Brown opponent painted as MAGA phony in high-stakes Nevada Senate race – Washington Examiner

Published

2 years ago

April 15, 2024

Sam Brown opponent painted as MAGA phony in high-stakes Nevada Senate race – Washington Examiner

Jeff Gunter has leaned on his MAGA credentials as he mounts a long-shot bid for Nevada’s Democrat-held Senate seat, highlighting his time spent as ambassador to Iceland under former President Donald Trump.

But it’s another part of Gunter’s background that is coming under scrutiny from a coalition of Trump allies and national Republicans who want to see front-runner Sam Brown prevail in the June primary: a voting and donation history they say contradicts his attempts to carry the MAGA mantle in the race.

Gunter, who runs a dermatology practice in the Los Angeles area, has for years been registered as a Democrat in California, according to voting records reviewed by the Washington Examiner.

Those records have dogged Gunter even before he launched his candidacy in August, providing his critics an opening to paint him as an out-of-state elite and fake conservative. He registered in Nevada as a Republican in 2021, six months before his latest California registration, but has acknowledged he at one time considered himself a Democrat.

“You know, Republicans often accuse their opponents of being California liberals, but this is one time when it’s actually true,” said one Trump-aligned operative not involved in the Nevada Senate race.

The line of attack belies his history as a prolific GOP donor, and the Gunter campaign notes his long tenure on the board of the Republican Jewish Coalition. He began his California dermatology practice in the 1990s but has operated offices in Nevada for years.

But that donation history, which stretches back two decades, also shows Gunter has given to some of Trump’s biggest Republican foes, among them former Rep. Liz Cheney and Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME), who voted to impeach, and in the case of Collins convict, the former president following the Capitol riot.

He donated to Cheney in 2016 and Collins in three separate cycles — 2008, 2014, and 2020 — according to Federal Election Commission records.

Gunter’s opponents have attempted to weaponize those donations, plus his lack of voting record in 2020, to frame him as disloyal to Trump. Gunter voted in the Nevada primary in February but before that had not cast a ballot since 2018, according to voting records obtained by the Washington Examiner.

“Jeff Gunter embarrassed President Trump with his clownish actions as ambassador, didn’t vote for Trump in 2020, and even donated to Liz Cheney. This guy can’t be trusted,” said one national GOP strategist who works on Senate races.

A 2021 State Department report found Gunter had created a “threatening and intimidating environment” during his stint as ambassador.

Erica Knight, a campaign spokeswoman, forcefully pushed back on the idea that Gunter is anti-Trump. “He was one of President Trump’s biggest advocates in both 2016 and 2020 and has never supported Democrats,” she said in a statement.

Gunter’s donation history includes $200,000 he gave to the Trump Victory PAC and Trump Inaugural Committee.

Knight further alleged that Gunter voted for Trump by mail in 2020 while performing his duties in Iceland, alluding to unfounded claims of fraud in addressing the lack of voting record.

“It is not surprising that a vote for Trump was ‘lost,’” she said, adding that his February vote in Nevada was cast for Trump.

The decided focus on Gunter’s loyalty to Trump underscores the former president’s continued sway with Republican voters, in Nevada and nationally, as he runs for a second term in the White House. But it also suggests an attempt by Brown’s allies to flip the script on what, until this point, has been Gunter’s narrative about Brown: that he is a Never Trumper.

Brown, a retired U.S. Army captain who mounted an unsuccessful run for Senate in 2022, is supported by Republicans in congressional leadership, including Steve Daines (R-MT), the chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee. Meanwhile, Trumpworld is divided over the race.

Brown was an open Trump supporter in 2020, door-knocking for his campaign, and even critiqued his 2022 rival, Adam Laxalt, for not doing more to challenge President Joe Biden’s election win.

But his endorsement of Trump this go around, which came in January, months later than his opponents, opened him up to questions over his continued allegiance to the former president.

FILE – Nevada Republican U.S. Senate candidate Sam Brown speaks to media after voting at Reno High School in Reno, Nevada, June 14, 2022. (AP Photo/Tom R. Smedes, File)

Gunter calls him “Scam Brown” and has, in an attempt to take the outsider lane in the race, accused him of being a puppet of Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), who attended a Washington, D.C., fundraiser for Brown in December.

McConnell, who has faced bitter personal attacks from Trump, fell out with the former president over the Jan. 6 riot.

“Sam Brown is backed by Trump-haters like Mitch McConnell and the Ukraine First caucus inside the DC swamp. Sam fits the mold of career politician, except he’s never actually won a race,” Knight said. “The choice for Nevada voters could not be any clearer.”

A second Trump-aligned operative noted that Gunter has repeatedly donated to McConnell’s reelection committees.

“I don’t think Gunter is going to be able to successfully paint his opponents as the establishment pick when he helped fund the establishment,” the operative, who requested anonymity to speak candidly, said.

The battle over fealty to Trump comes at a critical time in the race. There are just eight weeks until the June 11 primary, and the former president has yet to issue an endorsement that could prove decisive.

He posted a graphic on Truth Social Friday suggesting that a Trump-Brown ticket in Nevada is the path to victory in November but has not offered his formal support.

Brown made a trip to Mar-Lago the other week to ask for his endorsement, according to CNN. The trip follows a pilgrimage Gunter made in March, in which he held a fundraiser at the property attended by Trump.

Gunter is not the only Republican challenging Brown for the Republican nomination. In fact, his nearest competitor appears to be Jim Marchant, a Trump ally who lost last year’s race for Nevada secretary of state.

An internal poll released by the Brown campaign on Thursday shows Brown with 58% support to Marchant’s 6. Gunter is tied for third at 3%.

Nonetheless, Gunter raised eyebrows with a $3.3 million ad buy he announced earlier this month. He reserved the first $654,000 on Thursday, airing a TV ad that leans into his ambassadorship.

“When the stakes were high, Trump chose Gunter to represent the USA,” the 30-second spot declares.

He also counts hard-right Trump supporters, including Laura Loomer and Roger Stone, in his corner. Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) attended an event for Gunter earlier this month.

Already, Democrats are seizing on the attempts by Brown and his opponents to curry favor with the former president, framing them as “MAGA extremists” who would attempt to roll back abortion access nationally if elected to the Senate.

The winner of the primary will face Democrat Jacky Rosen, a one-term senator who consistently leads the polls but fares the worst against Brown.

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Brown’s allies have cited that polling in urging Gunter to drop out, fearing the bitter primary could hurt Republicans’ chances in a race that political handicappers rate a “toss-up.”

“We are running out of clock here, and it’s election season,” said the second Trumpworld operative. “We’d like to coalesce behind somebody sooner than later.”

Gabe Kaminsky contributed to this story.

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Nevada

How the strikes on Iran could impact gas prices in northern Nevada

Published

11 hours ago

March 2, 2026

Press Room

How the strikes on Iran could impact gas prices in northern Nevada

The United States and Israel launched targeted attacks on Iran on Saturday. The move brought new uncertainty into global energy markets, as northern Nevadans could be paying more at the pump in the coming weeks.

Following the strikes, oil prices increased. Brent crude, the international benchmark, jumped to roughly $73 a barrel, while the national benchmark, West Texas Intermediate, traded above $67.

Much of the concern centers around the Strait of Hormuz, a narrow waterway between Iran and Oman. which carries about a fifth of the world’s oil supplies.

Patrick de Haan, head of petroleum analysis with GasBuddy, a price tracking company, spoke on the current questions in the region.

“The known would reduce oil prices if there becomes clarity, but it’s the unknown that is stoking fears…. If there is some sort of clarity in the days ahead, whether from Iran, the United States, or Israel, on how long this would last. We’d be able to put potentially an end date for the potential impacts that we’re seeing,” said de Haan.

Experts say for every $5 to $10 increase in oil prices, drivers could pay 15 to 25 cents more per gallon.

According to Triple-A, the average price of a gallon of gas in Nevada on Sunday comes in at $3.70, which comes in above the national average of roughly $2.98.

Over at the Rainbow Market on Vassar Street, prices sat just below four dollars a gallon on Sunday. Reno resident Abran Reyes talked about gas prices potentially going up.

“Whether it’s to work, to maybe run errands, to do stuff that helps you, gas is essential…. That gas price really hits, especially in today’s economy, where gas prices are extraordinary…. I just hope everyone’s safe. I hope our soldiers and all of our troops can be okay,” said Reyes.

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Nevada

Nevada debuts public option amid federal health care shifts

Published

23 hours ago

March 1, 2026

Press Room

Nevada debuts public option amid federal health care shifts

More than 10,000 people have enrolled in Nevada’s new public option health plans, which debuted last fall with the expectation that they would bring lower prices to the health insurance market.

Those preliminary numbers from the open enrollment period that ended in January are less than a third of what state officials had projected. Nevada is the third state so far to launch a public option plan, along with Colorado and Washington state. The idea is to offer lower-cost plans to consumers to expand health care access.

But researchers said plans like these are unlikely to fill the gaps left by sweeping federal changes, including the expiration of enhanced subsidies for plans bought on Affordable Care Act marketplaces.

The public option gained attention in the late 2000s when Congress considered but ultimately rejected creating a health plan funded and run by the government that would compete with private carriers in the market. The programs in Washington state, Colorado, and Nevada don’t go that far — they aren’t government-run but are private-public partnerships that compete with private insurance.

In recent years, states have considered creating public option plans to make health coverage more affordable and to reduce the number of uninsured people. Washington was the first state to launch a program, in 2021, and Colorado followed in 2023.

Washington and Colorado’s programs have run into challenges, including a lack of participation from clinicians, hospitals, and other care providers, as well as insurers’ inability to meet rate reduction benchmarks or lower premiums compared with other plans offered on the market.

Nevada law requires that the carriers of the public option plans — Battle Born State Plans, named after a state motto — lower premium costs compared with a benchmark “silver” plan in the marketplace by 15% over the next four years.

But that amount might not make much difference to consumers with rising premium payments from the loss of the ACA’s enhanced tax credits, said Keith Mueller, director of the Rural Policy Research Institute.

“That’s not a lot of money,” Mueller said.

Three of the eight insurers on the state’s exchange, Nevada Health Link, offered the state plans during the open enrollment period.

Insurance companies plan to meet the lower premium cost requirement in Nevada by cutting broker fees and commissions, which prompted opposition from insurance brokers in the state. In response, Nevada marketplace officials told state lawmakers in January that they will give a flat-fee reimbursement to brokers.

The public option has faced opposition among state leaders. In 2024, a state judge dismissed a lawsuit, brought by a Nevada state senator and a group that advocates for lower taxes, that challenged the public option law as unconstitutional. They have appealed to the state Supreme Court.

Federal Policy Impacts

Recent federal changes create more obstacles.

Nevada is consistently among the states with the largest populations of people who do not have health insurance coverage. Last year, nearly 95,000 people in the state received the enhanced ACA tax credits, averaging $465 in savings per month, according to KFF, a health information nonprofit that includes KFF Health News.

But the enhanced tax credits expired at the end of the year, and it appears unlikely that lawmakers will bring them back. Nationwide ACA enrollment has decreased by more than 1 million people so far this year, down from record-high enrollment of 24 million last year.

About 4 million people are expected to lose health coverage from the expiration of the tax credits, according to the Congressional Budget Office. An additional 3 million are projected to lose coverage because of other policy changes affecting the marketplace.

Justin Giovannelli, an associate research professor at the Center on Health Insurance Reforms at Georgetown University, said the changes to the ACA in the Republicans’ One Big Beautiful Bill Act, which President Donald Trump signed into law last summer, will make it more difficult for people to keep their coverage. These changes include more frequent enrollment paperwork to verify income and other personal information, a shortened enrollment window, and an end to automatic reenrollment.

In Nevada, the changes would amount to an estimated 100,000 people losing coverage, according to KFF.

“All of that makes getting coverage on Nevada Health Link harder and more expensive than it would be otherwise,” Giovannelli said.

State officials projected ahead of open enrollment that about 35,000 people would purchase the public option plans. Of the 104,000 people who had purchased a plan on the state marketplace as of mid-January, 10,762 had enrolled in one of the public option plans, according to Nevada Health Link.

Katie Charleson, communications officer for the state health exchange, said the original enrollment estimate was based on market conditions before the recent increases in customers’ premium costs. She said that the public option plans gave people facing higher costs more choices.

“We expect enrollment in Battle Born State Plans to grow over time as awareness increases and as Nevadans continue seeking quality coverage options that help reduce costs,” Charleson said.

According to KFF, nationally the enhanced subsidies saved enrollees an average of $705 annually in 2024, and enrollees would save an estimated $1,016 in premium payments on average in 2026 if the subsidies were still in place. Without the subsidies, people enrolled in the ACA marketplace could be seeing their premium costs more than double.

Insights From Washington and Colorado

Washington and Colorado are not planning to alter their programs due to the expiration of the tax credits, according to government officials in those states.

Other states that had recently considered creating public options have backtracked. Minnesota officials put off approving a public option in 2024, citing funding concerns. Proposals to create public options in Maine and New Mexico also sputtered.

Washington initially saw meager enrollment in its Cascade Select public option plans; only 1% of state marketplace enrollees chose a public option plan in 2021. But that changed after lawmakers required hospitals to contract with at least one public option plan by 2023. Last year the state reported that 94,000 customers enrolled, accounting for 30% of all customers on the state marketplace. The public option plans were the lowest-premium silver plans in 31 of Washington’s 39 counties in 2024.

A 2025 study found that since Colorado implemented its public option, called the Colorado Option, coverage through the ACA marketplace has become more affordable for enrollees who received subsidies but more expensive for enrollees who did not.

Colorado requires all insurers offering coverage through its marketplace to include a public option that follows state guidelines. The state set premium reduction targets of 5% a year for three years beginning in 2023. Starting this year, premium costs are not allowed to outpace medical inflation.

Though the insurers offering the public option did not meet the premium reduction targets, enrollment in the Colorado Option has increased every year it has been available. Last year, the state saw record enrollment in its marketplace, with 47% of customers purchasing a public option plan.

Giovannelli said states are continuing to try to make health insurance more affordable and accessible, even if federal changes reduce the impact of those efforts.

“States are reacting and trying to continue to do right by their residents,” Giovannelli said, “but you can’t plug all those gaps.”

Are you struggling to afford your health insurance? Have you decided to forgo coverage? Click here to contact KFF Health News and share your story.

KFF Health News is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues and is one of the core operating programs at KFF — an independent source of health policy research, polling, and journalism. Learn more about KFF.

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Nevada

NEVADA VIEWS: Planning for a resilient economic future

Published

1 day ago

March 1, 2026

Press Room

NEVADA VIEWS: Planning for a resilient economic future

Southern Nevada has a proud history of competing — and winning — through boldness and reinvention. We have developed a world-class tourism economy, built globally recognized brands and demonstrated our ability to rebound from significant disruptions. In today’s fiercely competitive global economy, however, we must intentionally design the next chapter of our economic story. Communities worldwide are continuously enhancing their sophistication, and we must keep pace.

Since joining the Las Vegas Global Economic Alliance in late August of last year, I have consistently heard from community partners that we must diversify and enhance Southern Nevada’s economy. Our goal is to build upon and complement the strengths we already possess.

To achieve this, the alliance, as Southern Nevada’s regional economic development organization and designated Regional Development Agency, is embarking on a comprehensive strategic planning process. This initiative will guide our economic development priorities both in the near and long term, ensuring that we focus on areas that will yield the most positive impact.

The alliance has a history of reinvention, having been established in 1958 as the Southern Nevada Industrial Foundation, later becoming the Nevada Development Authority, and since 2011, operating under its current name in partnership with the Governor’s Office of Economic Development.

Economic development extends beyond merely attracting companies. It encompasses the ability of local families to access high-wage careers, the opportunity for young people to build their futures at home and the resilience of our economy to withstand disruptions.

Over the past decade, Southern Nevada has made significant strides toward economic diversification, with investment outcomes in 2025 surpassing those of 2024. However, our work is far from complete. While tourism will always be a foundational strength and source of pride for our region, over-reliance on any single sector poses risks. A diversified economy enhances stability, and stability creates opportunities. We are united in our desire for more accessible housing, expanded health care and education, and greater upward mobility for our residents.

This strategic planning effort aims to ensure that the alliance and its partners concentrate on the right initiatives in the right manner. It will validate the region’s target industries and subsectors, narrowing our focus on areas where Southern Nevada has genuine competitive advantages and long-term potential. The planning process will include community interviews, focus groups and surveys to ensure our final strategy reflects the real opportunities and challenges facing Southern Nevada. We will establish flagship goals and a prioritized strategy matrix to direct our attention and resources toward meaningful outcomes.

A crucial aspect of this process involves clarifying roles within the broader economic ecosystem. Economic development is a team sport — when organizations replicate efforts, operate in silos or compete for recognition, the region loses valuable time and credibility, allowing opportunities to slip away. I have witnessed this behavior in various markets, serving as a red flag for prospective companies.

We have already made strides in building partnerships, exemplified by a Memorandum of Understanding signed in November 2025 with the Economic Development Authority of Western Nevada to jointly support economic development education and advocacy for community leaders statewide.

Our strategic work will also include a organizational assessment of the alliance, evaluating our mission, resource deployment and engagement model. Economic impact requires operational excellence and measurable execution. Most importantly, this plan — which we anticipate completing by late April — will feature a three-year road map with clear timelines, recommended actions and meaningful metrics to transparently track our progress. A longtime mentor of mine often said, “What gets watched gets measured, and what gets measured gets done.”

Las Vegas has always taken the initiative to shape its own future. This strategic plan presents an opportunity for us to do what we do best: come together, think bigger, act smarter and create something lasting. Together, we can build a purposeful and resilient economic future for Southern Nevada.

Danielle Casey is president and CEO of the Las Vegas Global Economic Alliance.

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