Where the going gets tough (in Reno), Obama gets going

By David McGrath Schwartz

Monday, Aug. 18, 2008 | 2 a.m.

Sen. Barack Obama met privately with a handful of Nevada’s Democratic leaders Sunday before giving a short speech and answering questions from about 250 labor leaders and union members.

During the private meeting, Assemblywoman Sheila Leslie, an early Obama supporter, jokingly reminded Obama that he won Washoe County by 10 points in January’s Democratic caucus, she said.

“Yeah, but what about Elko? That was really great,” Obama responded, pointing to his 19 percentage point win over Sen. Hillary Clinton at a time when the nomination was still being contested.

Obama, the Democrats’ likely nominee for president, remembers the surprising support he had in Northern Nevada. Now the question is whether that support will continue and make the difference come November’s general election.

Nevada has emerged as a key battleground state, and although the bulk of the state’s population is firmly in Southern Nevada, the North, some think, will be a key to victory. Republicans have relied on strong margins in places such as Elko and Hawthorne and, to a lesser extent, Washoe County, to make up for the Democratic leanings of Las Vegas. For Democrats, it has been a place where candidates have spent time and money, only to see strong Republican numbers on Election Day.

At Sunday’s invitation-only event at a Reno high school, rather than go after a large crowd, Obama targeted labor supporters. It is a group Obama needs in order to win here.

Assemblywoman Debbie Smith, active in Northern Nevada organized labor, said if the Illinois senator is going to do well in the region, it’s important for him to get rank-and-file members onboard. Even though union leadership has endorsed his presidential bid, members have in the past broken ranks.

“We have a large Republican union membership,” she said.

Obama highlighted his economic plan, his push for renewable energy and his support of labor issues. He also swiped at presumed Republican nominee Sen. John McCain for what he said were “terrible” policies that benefited the wealthiest Americans. He repeatedly tried to tie the Arizona senator to President Bush.

One woman, who said she was a United Auto Workers member, asked: “What can we do to help you?”

Obama replied that the biggest thing union members can do is contact fellow members and shoot down rumors about his religion (he’s Christian) and his stance on gun control (he said he supports the Second Amendment, though he’s in favor of “common sense gun control”).

In January, Clinton won the caucus based on her showing in Clark County. Obama, though, actually won one more delegate to the national convention, thanks to his strength in rural and Northern Nevada.

McCain’s campaign said Obama’s strength in the caucus will not translate to the general election.

“You have to give credit where credit is due: The organization for the caucus was well-funded, well-organized,” said Mike DuHaime, political director of the McCain campaign, on a conference call with reporters Sunday. But, he said, caucuses tend to draw more involved voters — “liberal special interests, more activist, left-leaning voters” — than primaries do.

Indeed, McCain came in third in Nevada’s Republican caucus, behind former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney and Texas Rep. Ron Paul. But, DuHaime said, McCain did better nationally in primaries, as he will in the general election.

“His strength is in the center of the electorate,” DuHaime said. “Nevada continues to be a state that’s very much centrist.”

Kirsten Searer, spokeswoman for the Obama campaign, said the caucus helped build an organization in parts of the state where Democrats had been weak. She recalled how, when she was working for the state Democratic Party, she was so desperate for volunteers in rural Mineral County she went out with a sign in front of a casino to get someone interested.

“This campaign is all about grass roots,” Searer said. “If you have someone from Las Vegas or, God forbid, San Francisco, knocking on doors in Hawthorne, people won’t respond. You need supporters from Hawthorne knocking on doors in Hawthorne.”