6:16 p.m. | June 19, 2020
By Bree Zender
The mail-in ballots for Nevada's primary election have all been counted as of Friday. Northern Nevada filtered out many state assembly candidates in the process, as well as those running for a couple of seats in the U.S. Congress.
Who will be on your ballot in November? Check it out:
U.S. Congress
Democrat Patricia Ackerman will be facing Republican Incumbent Mark Amodei for his Congressional District 2 seat, representing Northern Nevada.
Ackerman beat six opponents, including former District 2 candidate Clint Koble.
In Congressional District 4, which encompasses much of Central Nevada and parts of Las Vegas, Republican Jim Marchant is expected to challenge Democratic Incumbent Steven Horsford.
Marchant topped his seven opponents for a spot on November’s general ballot. Horsford faced five competitors, all of whom he beat handily, despite reports of an extramarital affair surfacing in May.
Heading now to Southern Nevada, in what’s been seen as the most competitive congressional race in Nevada this season, Republican Dan Rodimer will go head-to-head with Democratic incumbent Susie Lee for District 3, for the southernmost tip of Nevada.
And in Vegas's heavily-Democratic District 1, Democratic incumbent Dina Titus is facing Republican Joyce Bentley.
Nevada State Assembly
President of the Washoe Education Association Natha Anderson has won the Democratic primary for Mike Sprinkle's old assembly seat in District 30, which represents much of Sparks and a good portion of Reno, near the airport.
Last session, Sprinkle resigned after several years in the seat, sending out a statement saying there were growing sexual harassment claims against him. Greg Smith was appointed to the seat but isn't campaigning this election.
Anderson will now face Republican Randy Hoff, who is a non-paid military veteran lobbyist, as well as far-right Independent American Party Member Charlene Young. KUNR was not able to locate a campaign website for this candidate.
For the assembly seat covering northeastern Sparks, as well as Sun and Lemmon Valleys, former State Assemblywoman Jill Dickman has defeated two Republican opponents in the primary for her old seat in District 31.
Dickman will go on to face incumbent Democrat Skip Daly in November's general election, in what is expected to be a close race. Dickman and Daly have faced off multiple times before. Daly held the seat from 2010 to 2014, and currently holds it.
Incumbent Lisa Krasner has again won her Republican primary for Assembly District 26, representing South Reno up the mountains to the northeastern side of Lake Tahoe.
Krasner will be on the general ballot against Democrat Vance Alm. KUNR was not able to locate a campaign website for this candidate.
For Southern Washoe County and Carson City’s assembly seat, Republican P.K. O'Neill will be facing off against Democrat Sena Loyd for District 40 in the general election in November.
O'Neill topped his opponent by 8 points for the seat last held by Republican Al Kramer, who according to The Nevada Appeal, withdrew from the race. On the Democratic side, Loyd defeated her other two opponents by more than 19 points and by 21 points respectively.
Incumbent Robin Titus handily won the Republican primary for Assembly District 38, representing much of Churchill and Lyon Counties, and she is the presumptive winner for the seat for the general.
Titus is running unopposed for the general but will still appear on November's ballot. She defeated Jeff Ulrich by 55 points to move on to the general.
Nevada State Senate
None of the Northern Nevada state senate candidates faced off against other opponents in their parties.
But in Southern Nevada, those competing for the post held by retiring Democratic Senator David Parks have faced a tight race for the Senate District 7, which represents an urban area south of Las Vegas and west of Henderson.
But, former state Democratic Party Chair Roberta Lange pulled through and defeated her two opponents, edging out current District 20 Assemblywoman Ellen Spiegel by a little over 1 point.
Lange is now the presumed winner of the general election for the district, as she is running unopposed in November.
7:46 p.m. | June 11, 2020
New vote tallies released Thursday did little to help some candidates make headway against the front runners who seem to be on track to appear on November's general election ballot.
According to the first vote count update after Tuesday's primary, it seems first-time congressional candidate Patricia Ackerman will face off against incumbent Republican Congressman Mark Amodei for his seat representing Nevada's second district.
However, many races remain too close to call.
In the Republican primary for congressional district four, former Assemblyman Jim Marchant holds a four-point, roughly 1,200-vote lead over Sam Peters.
Reno City Councilwoman Jenny Brekhus is also facing a tough challenge for her seat representing Ward 1, with only a nine-point lead over her closest opponent.
Results will not be finalized by the state until next week.
9:15 a.m. | June 10, 2020
According to data released by the Nevada Secretary of State, more than 369,000 people in Nevada took part in the state's first, mostly mail-in election. While the vast majority of the ballots were cast by mail, it's the in-person voters making news Wednesday morning.
Long lines plagued election officials in Clark and Washoe Counties Tuesday, with some voters waiting in lines in the Southern portion of the state well into the wee hours of the morning. The Secretary of State’s website has the latest information on races across the state here.
Editor's Note: This transcript has been updated to clarify that the results for Reno City Council and Washoe County School Board primary races remain unofficial and incumbents are most likely to appear on the general election ballot.
To get the latest on the election, KUNR’s Bree Zender spoke with our senior political reporter Paul Boger.
ZENDER: So, let's start talking about voter turnout. Looking at some of the data here, it looks like voter turnout was at least 23 percent statewide. How does that compare with previous primary elections?
BOGER: You're right: [It’s] 23% statewide. According to the numbers right now, that is expected to go up as ballots continue to trickle in over the next few days.
Now, how does that compare?
Well, the 2018 primary saw voter turnout at about 22 percent, so [it’s] a little higher. Here in Washoe County, in particular, though, we saw about 28.5% turnout, which is really fairly decent for a primary. Mind you, primaries are never as high as the general elections [as far as voter participation], but it is still a little bit higher than we expected.
ZENDER: Let's switch gears and quickly run over some of the results that we have so far. Are there any races we can make a pretty clear call in?
BOGER: First and foremost, I think it's pretty safe to say 2nd District Congressman Mark Amodei is safe. He will appear on the general election ballot. As a matter of fact, all of the congressional incumbents will appear on the November ballot. They did fairly well Tuesday.
It was really just a good night for incumbents, in general. We do know some of the smaller, local races as well. Republican Assemblywoman Lisa Krasner, of the state assembly, will also be on the ballot in November. So will Jill Dickman. She's a former assemblywoman who has kind of been in this back and forth with Democratic Assemblymen Skip Daly. So, we'll both see them on the ballot in November.
ZENDER: While this was a mostly mail-in election, thousands of people did vote in person Tuesday. This led to incredibly long lines here in Reno and in Clark County. Some voters in Southern Nevada were actually in line well into the early hours of the morning. What happened here?
Yeah, there were some incredibly long lines in Las Vegas. It wasn't quite as bad in Reno. Polls closed at 7 pm and the last voter cast a ballot about 90 minutes after that.
In Las Vegas though, voters were in line until about 1:30 or two in the morning casting ballots, and that's because of the nature of this switch to a mail-in primary. The Secretary of State originally had it so that one polling per place would be open in each county. Democrats sued to get more but settled for two additional polling places in Clark County. Unfortunately, it wasn't enough and Democrats sent out a statement late last night saying that they had predicted this.
So, we did see long lines. That being said, those people who voted in person typically either cited mistrust in the system, that they didn't receive their mail-in ballot, or they simply just like voting in person.
ZENDER: So, let's turn back to results here for a minute. What about some of these smaller local races? Can we make any sort of call?
BOGER: I would hesitate to make very many calls at this point. The reason for that is this was a mail-in election and all ballots will be counted as long as they were postmarked by June 9. That means ballots will probably be trickling in over the next week or so, and we will likely see a surge in these smaller races or at least a considerable amount of change. I don't want to go in too much into depth into the results at this point.
It was a good night for incumbents up and down the ballot. For Reno City Council, all of the incumbents there will [most likely] appear on the general election ballot. Same with Washoe County School Board. We expected to see some of that, and that's exactly what happened.
ZENDER: When will we know what the final results are?
According to state law, results have to be presented within 10 days. That's called canvassing, so all of the county registrars will canvass their votes, count all the votes, present those to the Secretary of State within the next 10 days. And after that, we should have official results.
