For retired Nevada businessman George Harris and his friends, the Biden administration’s “corrupt” nature should be “obvious to anybody that can read on a second grade level.”
“It’s like the Democrats jumped off the stupid tree and hit every branch on the way down,” Harris said in an interview with National Review.
This sincerely held conviction that Trump can turn the country around in a second term has prompted Harris and his friends to host a June 8 fundraiser in Las Vegas on behalf of the Trump 47 Committee, a joint fundraising arrangement that benefits the presumptive nominee’s campaign, the Trump-aligned Save America PAC, the Republican National Committee, and dozens of state parties.
The event’s co-hosts, which include include Ahern Rentals chief executive Don Ahern, Nevada Republican Club president Pauline Lee, and Ahern Luxury Boutique Hotel president Shane McFarland, have already raised more than $4 million toward their $15 million target, Harris tells National Review.
That fundraising boon in battleground Nevada comes as Trump, 77, leads President Joe Biden, 81, in the state by twelve points among registered voters in the latest New York Times/Siena College/Philadelphia Inquirer poll — a higher-than-expected lead in a crucial battleground state that could help tip the presidential election in his favor this fall.
Trump has held a comfortable lead in RealClearPolitics’ Nevada polling average for roughly six months now, as voters continue to sour on Biden’s handling of the economy, foreign policy, and immigration, among other issues.
Even if trends suggest that Trump has a strong chance of winning this state after losing it narrowly in 2016 and 2020, his campaign team has been coy about unveiling their ground game plans that will likely prove crucial to get-out-the-vote efforts in the lead-up to Election Day.
“There are more than 100 polls showing President Trump crushing Joe Biden, including recent polling that has him leading in Nevada, every key battleground state, and winning independents by double digits,” Trump spokeswoman Karoline Leavitt said in a statement to National Review. “President Trump remains laser focused on winning in November to make America great again.”
Beyond immigration, the economy, and the state’s high proportion of Republican-trending Hispanic voters, much of this presidential polling shift toward Trump in Nevada can likely be attributed to the transient nature of the state’s electorate, says Jessica Taylor, the senate and governors editor for the Cook Political Report.
“It’s why you always see close elections there. There’s just such high turnover in elections so you’re never really making your case to the exact same electorate,” Taylor tells National Review in an interview. “The turnover every four years is about 50 percent.”
Biden’s problems extend well beyond Nevada. Though the incumbent is far ahead of Trump in the fundraising department, this week’s New York Times poll suggests the president is losing hypothetical head-to-head matchups against Trump in Georgia, Michigan, Arizona and Pennsylvania.
Trump has spent recent weeks stuck in a Manhattan courtroom amid his first criminal trial involving hush money payments to an adult film star, and is showing face at fundraisers and rallies across the country whenever his trial schedule permits. He’s expected to make an appearance at next month’s Las Vegas fundraiser, according to the event invitation, though it’s unclear whether he will hold a rally in Nevada that weekend to coincide with the event.
The Las Vegas fundraiser hosts are hoping to accommodate 1,200 guests at the Ahern hotel for an event that will feature a private dinner for 160 people upstairs. Aside from Trump, Harris tells National Review that special guests also include country singer-songwriter Lee Greenwood and Dr. Jeffrey Gunter, Trump’s former ambassador to Iceland who is seeking the Republican nomination for U.S. Senate in Nevada this cycle.
Trump has declined to pick a favorite in Nevada’s Republican Senate primary. The stakes of this primary are high, as the winner could help determine control of the upper chamber.
Gunter, who declined to comment on whether he plans to attend next month’s Trump 47 Committee fundraiser, is one of many Republican candidates looking to oust Democratic Senator Jacky Rosen in November. Also competing in this year’s crowded Republican Senate primary in Nevada this cycle are Sam Brown, a businessman and retired U.S. Army captain, and Jim Marchant, a former state assemblyman who ran unsuccessfully for secretary of state in 2022.
Primary polling is sparse, but suggests Brown has an early edge over the rest of the field ahead of the June 11 primary. The military veteran lost the Republican Senate nomination to Adam Laxalt in 2022 but has the backing of the National Republican Senatorial Committee and the Koch group Americans for Prosperity this time around. He trails Rosen by just two points in a hypothetical head-to-head match-up in the latest New York Times survey.