A quick guide to swing state Nevada
- Published
Nevada, famous for Las Vegas and the Hoover Dam, is one of seven states that will decide the 2024 US presidential election.
Voting in swing states is hard to predict and can swing Republican or Democrat - that’s why you’re hearing so much about them as campaigning draws to a close.
Here’s all you need to know.
Population
3.178m (same as Kyiv, Ukraine)
Electoral college votes
6 of 538
In a nutshell
Nevada is notoriously "purple", rather than red for Republican or blue for Democrat. About a third of likely voters consider themselves independent.
2020 margin
Biden by 33,500 votes.
What's the deal now?
Both parties have tried to appeal to the state’s working-class voters by vowing to end taxes on tips, although in Kamala Harris’s case it’s paired with a promise to raise the federal minimum wage.
What are voters saying?
Inflation and housing prices are the big issues here, in a state that is still feeling the effects of the pandemic. "Everything was much cheaper before," says Juan Rodriguez, a Las Vegas call centre worker. "We're just hoping to see how they [the candidates] can lower the cost of living, and life in general."
The state has the highest level of unemployment in the US, at around 5.5%.
"People want things to get better. They want unemployment to go down, as well as the price of goods," says Diego Arancivia, a Chilean-American small business owner. "Lots of people will vote on economics alone."
Both parties have promised to end taxes on tips - in Harris' case alongside raising the federal minimum wage.
That's an attractive argument here, with lots of people working in tourism and hospitality.
"When they take a cut of one's tips, it's difficult for many people to live," says Olga Mexia, a housekeeper at a Las Vegas hotel. "That would really help a lot."
What's the expert view?
"The promise of Las Vegas was that you can come here, work a blue-collar job and live a white-collar lifestyle in a three-bedroom house with a pool," Las Vegas political science professor David Damore says.
"That was attainable right up until the pandemic.”
Strong economic messaging focused on recovery will likely be the most important keys to victory, he adds. Both parties will also have to woo Latino voters - 20% of the state’s electorate.
Latinos have the lowest voter registration rates in Nevada so getting more of them to come out to vote is a key target of both campaigns.
What to watch out for on election night
If you see the state’s two most populous counties, Clark and Washoe, go from Democrats to Republicans then Trump is in for a good night
If Sam Brown, the Trump-backed Republican running for Senate, suffers a heavy defeat then it will be seen as a rebuke for Maga politics
If Latino turnout is high then the Democrats may have the advantage, with recent polls showing that the party has an 18-point lead among the electorate
Reporting by Bernd Debusmann
