Temperament, professionalism and experience are prerequisites for statewide executive offices

Sunday, Oct. 23, 2022 | 2 a.m.

As we highlighted in our cover editorial, usually sleepy down-ballot races for the state’s executive offices have taken on a newfound importance as conspiracy theorists and election deniers seek to control the levers of government. While they don’t get a lot of attention in the news media, state executives are ultimately responsible for safeguarding free and fair elections, managing billions of dollars in taxpayer money and enforcing a system of justice that defends civil rights and liberties while seeking to make victims whole.

In Nevada, where the Legislature meets every other year, having a competent and forward-thinking executive branch is even more important because laws cannot be changed quickly to address evolving needs.

As with our congressional delegation, Nevada is fortunate to have a slate of candidates seeking statewide elected office who share an inspirational vision of a better future for all Nevadans. Aaron Ford, Cisco Aguilar, Zach Conine, Lisa Cano Burkhead and Ellen Spiegel each have the knowledge, skills and experience necessary to be successful in their respective offices. But working together, as a team, they have the potential to transform Nevada into an educational and economic powerhouse and the envy of other states.

In our endorsement interviews, they passionately described how they could transform their respective offices to better support local small business, improve law enforcement, bring opportunities for job training and economic prosperity to rural areas of the state, improve education, diversify the state’s economy, and realize safer, healthier communities.

Moreover, their visions went beyond mere rhetoric and provided nuanced, concrete, detailed plans for delivering a better future for Nevada. We offer an excited and inspired endorsement to each of them individually, and to all of them as the collective team of leaders Nevada needs.

Attorney General: Aaron Ford

Aaron Ford describes the job of the attorney general as pursuing justice for all Nevadans.

“Whether a person has lived here for three months, three years or three generations, you are part of the Nevada family,” he said.

It’s an apt statement because in his first term as Nevada’s attorney general, Ford defended Nevadans as though he was defending members of his own family. He went after pharmaceutical companies that fueled the opioid epidemic, recovering more than $300 million in settlements for families whose lives were turned upside down by opioids.

In just four short years, Ford cleared a 30-year backlog of untested rape kits that no attorney general — Democrat or Republican — had been able to make meaningful progress on. This is a powerful statement on his dedication to helping victims of crime get justice.

And he worked directly with law enforcement and activists alike to reach compromise on meaningful police reform to improve police relationships with the communities they serve while maintaining strong support from more than a dozen different law enforcement organizations and associations.

Ford has been so effective that he earned the endorsement of multiple leaders in the Republican Party as well as law enforcement bodies.

Meanwhile, his opponent, Sigal Chattah, is running to be the state’s top law enforcement officer despite having no respect for the law. She blatantly flaunts election laws in her calls to install Donald Trump as president of the United States. She discusses prosecuting women who seek abortions by charging them with murder. In what was perhaps the most disgusting and abhorrent statement of the entire election cycle, she joked about lynching Ford, a Black man.

In no rational world would we trust Chattah to serve in the state’s top law enforcement position. Ford has proven that he will serve the interests of all Nevadans with incredible efficiency and effectiveness.

Secretary of State: Cisco Aguilar

The chasm between the qualifications of Cisco Aguilar and his opponent, Jim Marchant, is almost unfathomable. As are the stakes should Nevadans choose Marchant over Aguilar.

Marchant is a conspiratorial election denier of the worst variety. He not only spreads the false narrative of mass voter fraud and a conspiracy to steal the 2020 election from Trump, but he is now seeking control of the electoral process to ensure his chosen candidate will win.

He has repeatedly stated that he will not submit for certification the results of an election in which he believes his candidate should have won.

Reread that.

A candidate for the state’s highest elections officer openly states that he will ignore the law, ignore the will of the voters and refuse to do his duty if the person he supports doesn’t win.

Ask yourself this: Why should anyone vote for a secretary of state who promises to throw out valid votes he disagrees with?

That is reason enough to vote for Aguilar. But add to it the fact that Aguilar may be the most extraordinary candidate we have interviewed in recent memory and the choice is clear. In every way that matters, he represents the best of what one hopes for in a public servant: he’s clearly brilliant, has a strong ethical core, has a refined sense of justice and understands, to the core, that his job is to work for Nevadans.

His plan to overhaul Silver Flume, the state’s aging corporate securities system, is nothing short of inspired in its ability to help small businesses, giant corporations and nonprofit organizations alike.

His vision for restoring faith in Nevada’s electoral processes should be a model for the rest of the country.

And his dedication to ensuring every single legally cast ballot is counted — regardless of which candidate they vote for — gives us faith that with Aguilar at the helm, Nevada will continue to have free and fair elections.

Nevadans certainly should vote for Aguilar for who he is and what he aspires to do. However, an equally strong case for electing him is that he is not Jim Marchant. Marchant must be prevented from wielding any power in this state because he means to harm Nevadans and steal our rights.

Aguilar is the only responsible choice for Secretary of State.

Treasurer: Zach Conine

Prior to meeting Zach Conine, we didn’t fully appreciate just how frightening it would be for the wrong person to be elected as treasurer. As the state’s chief investment officer, the treasurer manages billions of dollars in state assets. If those accounts are mismanaged, it could spell disaster for retirees whose retirement accounts are part of the state’s portfolio. It could devastate our education system and contributions to Nevada’s prepaid tuition program and scholarship and college savings account could vanish. And it could destroy the state’s credit rating, costing taxpayers hundreds of millions of dollars in interest.

Fortunately, Conine has spent the past four years getting the state’s investments in order. Thanks to his leadership, Nevada now boasts the highest credit rating in the history of the state. We’re also enjoying one of the fastest economic recoveries from the COVID pandemic of any states in the U.S.

Conine did all of that while returning $10 million in unclaimed property to Nevadans when they needed it most and passing legislation to bring as much as $500 million in federal money into the state’s coffers.

He’s legitimately and objectively good at his job.

So good, in fact, that numerous Republican leaders endorsed him over his Republican opponent, Michele Fiore, who doesn’t seem to even know what office she’s running for.

We’re not kidding. Fiore is perhaps the most unqualified candidate to seek the office of the treasury in Nevada’s history.

She’s a conspiracy theorist who accused Conine of operating a secret business out of the Treasurer’s Office. In reality, the business in question was the Nevada Capital Investment Corporation — a government entity that the state’s treasurer is constitutionally required to run.

On the campaign trail she discusses “freedoms for our families.” For the life of us, we can’t figure out what “freedoms” she’s discussing in relation to the Treasurer’s Office.

Electing Fiore to manage billions of dollars in state-held funds would put Nevada’s entire economy at risk, while Conine has repeatedly demonstrated that under his leadership, the state’s investment portfolio will continue to grow.

Lieutenant Governor: Elizabeth ‘Lisa’ Cano Burkhead

A first-generation American Latina whose parents both worked in Las Vegas service industries, Lisa Cano Burkhead understands the struggles that many Nevadans face in their pursuit of the American dream.

Despite being a largely symbolic office that she has occupied for only 10 months, she already has a strong grasp of how the Lieutenant Governor’s Office can be used for transformative change.

Cano Burkhead chairs the Keep Nevada Working Taskforce and oversees the Office of Small Business Advocacy, and has already begun advocating for the need to streamline paperwork and processes for entrepreneurs and connect small-business owners with skilled job seekers, state and federal grants, and mentorship opportunities.

As chair of the Nevada Commission on Tourism, she is working to expand eco- and adventure tourism that will bring fresh revenue to the state, promote healthy lifestyles and take advantage of Nevada’s beautiful environment and reliably warm and dry climate.

As a lifelong educator and the founder of the highly successful One Hill initiative, she is also using her position to advocate for better K-12 schools and greater parent involvement in education.

Ironically, her opponent, Stavros Anthony, has identified many of the same issues as being important to Nevadans. But unlike Cano Burkhead, he has provided absolutely no plans or details for addressing those issues. He canceled his interview with the Sun and never rescheduled. And the entire policy platform he lists on his website is a grand total of 40 words long.

A conspiratorial election denier who has offered no policy details whatsoever, Anthony is unfit for office and should be rejected.

Cano Burkhead recognizes what a good leader can accomplish, even in a position with limited power, and we are excited to endorse her and see what she can accomplish with a full term in office.

Controller: Ellen Spiegel

Republican Andy Matthews’ rhetoric about bringing transparency to government spending is intriguing. But his failure to respond to our invitation for an endorsement interview means we never had a chance to learn more about it. When combined with his strong ties to election-denying conspiracy theorists such as Adam Laxalt, Stavros Anthony, Sam Peters and Michele Fiore, it’s difficult to imagine a scenario in which he would be qualified to serve as the state’s chief financial officer.

Ellen Spiegel, on the other hand, is a five-term assemblywoman with education and experience in technology, economics and commerce. We believe she is among the most highly qualified candidates to ever seek the position of controller and we endorse her without reservation.

Given these connections and Matthews’ decision to ignore our invitation, we fear that Matthews is not only unfit for the office of controller but is a potential threat to the stability and well-being of Nevada as a state.