Presidential candidate Rand Paul brings his message to Sun City Summerlin

By Conor Shine

Saturday, April 11, 2015 | 4:16 p.m.

The election is still 19 months away, but campaign season has officially arrived in Las Vegas after a visit today from Republican presidential contender U.S. Sen. Rand Paul to a Summerlin-area retirement community.

Speaking before a standing-room-only crowd at the Desert Vista Community Center in Sun City Summerlin, the Kentucky senator laid out a vision for the country focused on individual freedoms and liberty that has won him a fervent base of support among libertarians while also appealing to a broader coalition that bucks traditional party lines.

"A while back I decided to count up a few things," Paul said shortly after taking the stage. "I found out the Lord's Prayer is 66 words long. The Gettysburg Address is 286 words long. The Declaration of Independence is 1,322 words long. But the government regulation for the sale of cabbage is 26,911 words long."

Flanked by a sign bearing his campaign slogan "Defeat the Washington Machine, Unleash the American Dream," Paul launched into a 25-minute speech that framed himself as an outsider "unafraid to challenge the status quo" of current-day government.

Paul, an ophthalmologist who was first elected to the Senate in 2011, moved quickly from point to point as he laid out his campaign platform, promising to repeal the Affordable Care Act, cut the federal debt and push for a constitutional amendment requiring balanced federal budgets.

"I want to reform Washington. I want common-sense rules that will break the logjam in Congress," Paul said. "The love of liberty pulses in my veins ... our great nation was founded upon the extraordinary notion that government should be restrained and that freedom should be maximized."

Paul drew the largest applause when he spoke about his views on foreign policy and civil liberties, which have set him apart from many other potential Republican presidential contenders.

"Without question we must defend ourselves and American interests from all of our enemies.

"But until we name the enemy, we can't win the war ... the enemy is radical Islam," Paul said.

Paul called for a "robust" national defense but said his foreign policy wouldn't involve nation building abroad.

"Let's quit building bridges in foreign countries and use that money to build some bridges in ours," he said.

He criticized the National Security Agency's surveillance programs for collecting phone and computer records of American citizens, calling them a threat to civil liberties.

"The president created this vast dragnet by executive order ... as president, on day one I will immediately end this unconstitutional program," he said.

Paul is the first declared presidential candidate running in 2016 to visit Las Vegas after formally announcing his campaign on Tuesday. His visit will be the first of many from presidential hopefuls from both parties looking to win support in Nevada, which holds a key place on the primary calendar as the first caucus state in the West.

Paul's appearance comes several weeks after likely Republican presidential candidate Jeb Bush spoke to a crowd in the same Sun City Summerlin community center. Florida Sen. Marco Rubio stopped by Las Vegas Barnes & Noble in February for a book signing.

Paul's visit to Las Vegas, his second this year, came as part of a swing across key election states that included Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina.

Paul is looking to find a strong base of support in libertarian-friendly Nevada, where grass-roots efforts boosted the presidential campaigns of his father, former U.S. Rep. Ron Paul, in 2008 and 2012.

The crowd Saturday featured many supporters who were big fans of Ron Paul and are equally excited to support his son Rand Paul's quest to take the White House in 2016.

"He has ideas you don't see in typical Republicans," said Las Vegas Daphne Lee, who spoke before Paul and introduced him to the Sun City Summerlin crowd.