Nevada is a swing state – and might be an indicator of more extreme partisanship

Throughout Nevada's history, nobody party has dominated the state's politics, and its electorate has remained surprisingly balanced in its political leanings. Since Nevada became a state in 1864, it has equal representation by the federal delegation: 14 US Senators from each of the key parties and 20 members of the US House of Representatives from the Democratic and Republican parties.

The same parity exists on the state level. There was 31 Governors of Nevada: 15 Republicans, 12 Democrats, and two each from the Silver Party – energetic on the turn of the twentieth century – and the Silver Democrat Party. The Silver Democrats eventually merged into the Democratic Party.

While State Senate was controlled 48 times by the Republicans and 28 times by the Democrats, the proportional control of the State Assembly the alternative is the case: 50 times the Democrats had the bulk in parliament, 26 times the Republicans were in the bulk.

All of this results in Nevada’s unusual status in today’s politics: It is neither a red nor a blue state. And that has led some to call it a “swing state” for the 2024 presidential elections.

However, as a long-time Nevadan and scholar Those who study political systems can see how Nevada is becoming increasingly polarized along party lines. Will this increasing polarization push the state away from its historical political impartiality?

The economyparticularly concerns about inflation, gasoline prices and inexpensive housing, are top of mind for Nevada voters. Republicans argue the economy is getting worse, while Democrats claim it’s improving. And controversial issues that can likely appear on the November 2024 ballot – Abortion rights, Voter ID required And Allow teachers to strike – have contributed to polarizing rhetoric in local and national elections.

Balanced from the widest angle

When taking a look at Nevada politics in a broader sense, political representation from each major parties appears balanced. However, a more in-depth look reveals that the landscape has modified over the past few a long time.

Culturally, Nevada is related to easy marriage and divorce, casino gambling, legal prostitution, and a laid-back, anything-goes mentality—all summed up within the famous slogan “What happens here stays here.”

In reality, Nevada was also politically conservative, even amongst DemocratsThis cauldron of contradictory images has produced a political landscape that alternated between Republican and Democratic dominance each at federal and state level.

From Nevada's rise to statehood in 1864 to 1890Republicans ran the state. All federal and state representatives except two legislators were Republicans in 1864, when Nevada became the thirty sixth state.

From 1890 to 1908, Nevada was governed by Silver Partywhich advocated the unlimited coinage of silver, a serious economic issue within the United States within the late nineteenth century. By 1902, a lot of the pro-silver factions in Nevada had been absorbed by the state's Democratic Party.

From 1908 to Nineteen ThirtiesControl was roughly evenly split between Republicans and Democrats, with Democrats winning more positions but Republicans winning more victories in top presidential and gubernatorial elections.

After the election of Democratic President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1932, Democrats dominated Nevada politics until the Eighties, when Republicans re-emerged; in late 1995 Republican voter registrations In Nevada, Democrats outnumbered Democrats for the primary time because the Nineteen Thirties.

But by 2004The political tide had turned in favor of the Democrats again because of the Democratic Party's strong voter mobilization efforts.

Nevada is a extremely strong federal state. Culinary Unionwhich represents over 60,000 hospitality staff in Nevada, is especially influential. The “Reid Machine”, a loose coalition of progressive groups named after the late U.S. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, began work within the mid-Nineteen Nineties, with the Culinary Union pushing to register its working-class, young, Latino, black and Asian members as voters. These efforts intensified after Democrats’ losses in 2002The union and progressives then worked together to get people to vote – through early voting, in person on election day or by mail.

These efforts have had probably the most significant impact the state lawswhere Democrats have almost all the time controlled the State Assembly since 1997, apart from a two-year session in 2015, and have controlled the State Senate since 2009, apart from the 2015 session.

Splitting the ticket

Nevada's Federal Delegation since 2019 has been dominated by Democrats, who held three of the 4 seats within the U.S. House of Representatives and each seats within the U.S. Senate. But despite the rise in Democratic registrations and the efforts of the “Reid machine,” just about all governors Republicans have been elected since 1998. The only exception was the election of Democrat Steve Sisolak for a four-year term in 2018.

These party differences between federal and state officials arise because Nevadans are known ballot splitters, are proud to vote more on facts and personalities over party loyalty or identity.

And to exhibit the political independence of Nevada’s residents, the state added in 1976:None of those candidates“ as an option for all state and federal offices. It is the one state within the US with this feature.

Voting behavior in Nevada has led to voters within the state fairly reliably voting for Winners of the presidential election. In the 40 presidential elections wherein Nevada has participated between 1864 and 2020, the state has voted for the winning candidate 33 times. And within the 23 presidential elections since 1912, its electoral votes have gone to the winning presidential candidate in all but two elections – 1976 and 2016.

With a view to the upcoming elections

At the federal level, in line with current polls, Nevada residents will split their votes in November 2024. Former President Donald Trump is ahead of Joe Biden by about 5 percentage pointswhile incumbent Democratic Senator Jacky Rosen is ahead of her challenger, Republican Sam Brown, with over 10 percentage points.

The “Reid Machine” still exists, but its power has been waning because the former senator’s death in 2021. The Culinary Union, often related to the Democrats, is Feud with the Democratic Party of Nevada over their support for repealing in 2023 a COVID-era law passed in 2020 that required regular room cleansing. This has led to the union refusing to endorse plenty of Democratic state representatives. While this doesn’t mean the union will support Republicans, the dispute could hurt the union's efforts to get voters to the polls.

In addition, the variety of independent voters in Nevada now exceeds the variety of registered voters of each the Democratic and Republican parties. Data from the Nevada Secretary of State’s Office shows that 33.8% of energetic registered voters are unaffiliated, in comparison with 30.3% Democrats and 28.8% Republicans. As my research has confirmed, independents are notoriously unpredictable of their voting decisions.

Nevada is exclusive in that it’s one in all the country's blue-collar states. Demographically, it's a fairly good reflection of the country as an entire. There are high percentages of Latinos and Asian Americans, and each parties compete for those voters.

The increasing variety of voters leaving the 2 major parties and calling themselves independent, coupled with the growing divide between the 2 major political parties and polarizing political rhetoric, could also be more reflective of the direction the remaining of the states are heading.

Nevada is more likely to remain a swing state because of its political divisions, however the state's rising variety of independent voters might be an indication of the direction the electorate is moving nationally.