Having barely lost Nevada in 2016, President Donald Trump will make a play for the state with the belief that the strong economy, successes of his first term and an improved field operation will be enough to make the difference, campaign officials said Friday.
“Nevada is one of the ones we think we can win,” Tim Murtaugh, the Trump campaign’s director of communications, told a group of regional reporters Friday. “We’ll be involved in Nevada.”
Murtaugh said the booming economy gives the president a potent message that he did not have as a first-time seeker of elected office.
“The president’s message: the economy is as strong as it has ever been,” Murtaugh said. “Last time, the president was just a candidate promising things and now he can point to a record of clear accomplishments.”
In April, the national unemployment rate hit 3.6 percent, the lowest since 1969, according to the Labor Department. It was 3.8 percent in March. Real gross domestic product (GDP), the broadest measure of economic activity, expanded by 2.9 percent in 2018, the strongest growth since 2015. The latest figures available for Nevada put the unemployment rate at 4.2 percent in March.
“Knowing how close he was the last time, with a superior ground game, now, our political guys think we can win,” Murtaugh said.
Find out how Latino voters will affect Trump's 2020 ambitions in Nevada in the full story at the Nevada Independent.
