Election aftermath: What we learned about Nevada

By Las Vegas Sun Staff (contact)

Wednesday, Nov. 9, 2016 | 2 a.m.

A compendium of what Las Vegas Sun staff members learned about Nevada this election cycle:

Hispanic voters in Nevada were a force. For proof, look no further than the results for Hillary Clinton and U.S. Senate candidate Catherine Cortez Masto, both of whom benefited from extensive efforts to activate Hispanic voters.

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Clinton's ground operations didn't work everywhere, but they did in Nevada. Clinton established Nevada operations well before the caucuses and kept working in Nevada throughout the election, including airing commercials in English and Spanish. It turned out to be a smart move, helping her defeat caucus opponent Bernie Sanders and giving her a leg up on Trump. Trump's Nevada operations were never strong — his strategy consisted mostly of holding occasional rallies — and the disparity showed in Tuesday's results. Clinton fell in Florida, Ohio, North Carolina and other battleground states, but she carried Nevada with room to spare.

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Since 2000, more people in Clark County have voted before Election Day than on Election Day. By 2012, between early voting and absentee voting, 69.3 percent of those in Nevada who voted in the presidential election in 2012 did so before Election Day, an increase from 66.9 percent in 2008. Final turnout numbers aren’t in yet and while the 2016 presidential race was anything but predictable, we might expect the trend to vote early to continue this year and beyond.

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Nevada’s early voting received national attention after a Clark County District Court judge on Tuesday morning denied the Trump campaign’s request to preserve evidence from four polling places it alleges violated election rules by staying open late. Early-voting procedures may be under a microscope, as long lines kept polls open as many as three hours past the 7 p.m. posted closing time on Friday, the final day of early voting.

“Most if not all of our early voting locations had lines of voters when their scheduled closing time passed,” county spokesman Dan Kulin said. "As has been our practice for many, many years those early voting locations continued processing voters until the lines were gone.”

An attorney for Clark County Registrar of Voters Joe Gloria told Judge Gloria Sturman that, unlike on Election Day, early voters are allowed to get in line after the posted closing time, and the polls remain open until everyone has cast a ballot. Sturman noted that Gloria was already compelled by law to preserve election records.

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Visits to Las Vegas in the last week by both Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton, as well as prominent surrogates such as Rudy Giuliani and Bill Clinton, demonstrate the perceived importance of Nevada’s six electoral votes. Signaling the state’s continued status as a swing state: UNLV hosted the final presidential debate of the season, and Nevada officials vowed to renew efforts to attract a national political convention to Las Vegas. This year represents only the second time Nevada (Gerald Ford over Jimmy Carter in 1976) has failed to back the national winner since 1912.

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As U.S. Sen. Harry Reid retires, Nevada Democrats added to what was becoming a very thin bench. Catherine Cortez Masto became the first Latina elected to the U.S. Senate, while Ruben Kihuen and Jacky Rosen join Dina Titus in the U.S. House of Representatives. With Democrats gaining control of the state Assembly, a new speaker becomes a powerful voice in the party.