JUST IN: Republicans Take Early Voting Lead In State Democrats Have Held For Decades

Republicans are receiving more encouraging turnout numbers showing former President Donald Trump expanding the electoral map beyond the traditional six swing states that he and Vice President Kamala Harris are eyeing: Wisconsin, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Georgia, Arizona, and North Carolina. For the second time in as many weeks, surveys show that the Republican is putting another Sun Belt state in play, one that hasn’t gone red in 20 years.

Nevadans, who encompass a transient workforce of service industry voters living in an epicenter of the nation’s housing crisis, are apparently fed up with giving Democrats the benefit of the doubt each presidential election. Less than two weeks ago, Politico reported that Trump had opened a 5-point lead over Harris, putting him on track to be the first Republican presidential candidate to win the blue-hued state since former President George W. Bush in 2004. That result is now no longer a one-off, according to the Nevada Independent.

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Early voter data produced by the secretary of state show that Republicans have a 2.5% edge in turnout, a remarkable feat considering the reticence by party members to embrace a method of voting that leaders have long said is ripe with opportunities for fraud. A record 333,000 voters, or 16.6% of the electorate, have cast their ballots as of Wednesday, but the impressive number is not leading to outsize gains in the urban Las Vegas area where Democrats hold just a 1-point lead in exit polls. By contrast, Republicans hold a nearly 3% edge in statewide turnout; if that results holds, and traditionally conservative Election Day turnout also favors President Trump, he can be expected to pick up the state’s six electoral votes.

While Republicans who spoke with reporter Jon Ralston are “giddy” about the early results, he cautioned them that Harris supporters still believe there is a path to victory. “So what does this mean? It means Kamala Harris has to win indies by close to double digits if this turnout scenario holds. That is, unless she holds her base several points better than Trump holds his, which is possible but not necessarily likely. This is how the Dems still, think they hold on: They believe a lot of the indies, especially in Clark, are their indies,” he writes.

Nearly one in five Nevada voters identify as nonwhite Latino, according to the NALEO Educational Fund, a demographic that Harris is struggling to coalesce behind her candidacy. The L.A. Times reported earlier this month that Harris, even as she leads comfortably in sapphire-blue California, is having a tough time closing the deal with the state’s large swaths of Latino voters. Much the same phenomenon may be occurring in Las Vegas.

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