Clark County Sheriff Joe Lombardo speaks during a Racial Justice and the Justice System panel discussion at the College of Southern Nevada, Cheyenne Campus, Saturday, July 17, 2021. Aaron Rouse, special agent in charge for the FBI in Nevada, listens at right. The event was hosted by the NAACP of Las Vegas and sponsored by the LVMPD Foundation.
Thursday, Aug. 12, 2021 | 2 a.m.
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North Las Vegas Mayor John Lee gives a welcome address during a ribbon cutting for Dignity Health-St. Rose Dominican's new North Las Vegas hospital on Thursday, June 15, 2017.
Leaders are required to take courageous stands on what is right. It’s in the DNA of real leaders to do so. Cowardice is not a trait associated with leadership.
On numerous occasions since Clark County Sheriff Joe Lombardo and North Las Vegas Mayor John Lee announced they would seek the Republican nomination for governor, the Sun has requested interviews with them to get their stances on GOP extremism.
Our questions aren’t complicated. They include: Is Joe Biden the rightfully elected president of the United States? Were the results of the 2020 election in Nevada valid? Do Lombardo and Lee support or reject the state Republican Party’s censure of Secretary of State Barbara Cegavske over the state’s results from the election? Is there any reason to believe there was significant fraud in the 2020 election nationally? What are Lombardo’s and Lee’s thoughts about the Jan. 6 insurrection? Do Lombardo and Lee condemn last week’s racist comments from Nye County Commissioner Donna Cox’s racist comments about Nevada first lady Kathy Sisolak?
But despite multiple emails and phone calls over several days to their campaigns, neither would sit down with us. Or take a phone call. Or respond to our questions in any way.
In putting up a wall of silence, it’s clear that the two have chosen to duck our questions.
This is not what leadership looks like.
Lombardo and Lee owe Nevadans answers to these questions, which relate directly to whether our community can trust them to serve us responsibly and equitably in any elected position, including their current ones.
Lombardo’s responsibility in this sense is even greater than Lee’s, as Lombardo serves more Southern Nevadans and has a direct role in protecting their safety.
And let’s make no mistake, the extremism within the party that Lombardo and Lee have chosen to represent has become a matter of public safety, as shown by the Jan. 6 insurrection, threats by Big Lie conspirators to election officials during the 2020 election, and threats allegedly made by members of the violent Proud Boys organization to moderate leaders of the Clark County Republican Party.
So where does Lombardo stand on this extremism and the growing threat it represents to Southern Nevadans? That’s an important question given that he’s ultimately responsible for dispatching officers to protect the peace and keep people out of harm’s way.
Metro has been called twice in the past few weeks to situations where far-right agitators disrupted meetings and created potentially dangerous situations — one a Clark County Republican Party meeting where members of the Proud Boys egged on the crowd, the other where a group of anti-maskers took over a town hall meeting that was supposed to focus on allocation of federal coronavirus relief funds and instead devolved into people shouting and getting in others’ faces.
And yet Lombardo, who is atop Metro, lacks the spine to comment on these matters?
That’s not to mention any number of other situations nationwide where law enforcement has had to respond to violent activity or tense situations triggered by the extremist right.
How can Lombardo serve as sheriff while running for a party that, with its threats and violence, is violating the law? This is a party where a significant faction is trying to intimidate leaders into subverting democracy.
Why isn’t Lombardo condemning these violent extremists in no uncertain terms? Why isn’t Lee?
The obvious answer is they’re scared of losing votes in a primary, so they’re trying not to alienate far-right GOP voters — including the violent faction.
Or maybe they’re trying to hide who they really are — cheap opportunists, or worse, people who believe democracy should be subverted. Because they are too cowardly to answer the questions, we can’t tell which it is.
Either way, they’re showing themselves to be unfit for any leadership position.
Lombardo has ducked and dodged on the Big Lie on the rare instances he has taken questions, initially saying he had seen no evidence of voter fraud but then posting on his campaign site that expanded voting access last year “increased voter fraud,” while offering zero evidence. Lee seems to have avoided the issue altogether. And neither addresses issues related to GOP extremism — the insurrection, violent elements in the party, etc. — on his campaign website.
There’s a school of thought that the two won’t answer these questions because at heart they’re moderates who need to protect themselves from being defeated by a Trumpian extremist in the primary election. As that theory has it, by not allowing themselves to be pinned down on the questions, they can spar on the issues in the primary and then apply moderate principles if elected in November.
But if someone’s willing to sell out their principles to win a primary, why wouldn’t they sell them out again after winning office? And if they won’t answer basic questions before a primary, why wouldn’t they also duck important questions as governor?
The issue goes far deeper than candor with the voters.
As our democracy hung in the balance after the 2020 election, it was defended by people from both parties who had the courage to stand up to extremists and their lies. If Lombardo and Lee are terrified of conspiracy theory whack jobs today, what are the chances they could stand up to a deranged Trump phone call tomorrow? They are proving too willing to sell out the state and the voters by hiding.
History measures leaders by who shows up in an emergency; this pair tucks tail and runs to protect their personal ambition, while letting others fight for what’s right. It’s a day of shame for Nevada Republicans that so far these two profiles in cowardice are the best they can field in the race for governor.
At one time, Lombardo took centrist stances on right-wing wedge issues like immigration and gun safety. In 2019, he withdrew Metro from collaboration with Immigration and Customs Enforcement on detainers that kept undocumented immigrants incarcerated on underlying charges until ICE agents could pick them up. He also questioned the need for civilian access to assault-type weapons with high-capacity magazines.
Lee was a Democrat until he switched parties this year. Enough said.
Now, though, as they hide and quiver from important questions, people they were elected to serve face a clear and present threat. Those at risk include election officials who are going about their job with integrity and fortitude, moderate Republicans who are trying to rescue their party from its fascist and violent faction, minority Nevadans and immigrants who face a threat from the neo-Nazi racist groups that Lombardo and Lee refuse to condemn, and more.
It would be bad enough if Lombardo and Lee were private-sector candidates with no voters to serve, but they’re elected officials with an obligation to protect the best interests and the safety of their communities.
So where do Lombardo and Lee stand on these very basic issues of civility? They stand mute. And that is disheartening, disappointing and in our view, disqualifying.
