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Trump campaign pushes for Nevada as COVID-19 cripples economy

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LAS VEGAS – Derek Stonebarger, owner of ReBar, a bar that doubles as an 
antique store in the Las Vegas Arts District, was just starting to get 
back on his feet when Nevada Gov. Steve Sisolak ordered bars to once again 
close.

“It's a scary time to be a small business owner. It's a scary time to have 
your American dream literally ripped from you,” Stonebarger said.

Less than two months after reopening businesses and the iconic Las Vegas 
Strip, a rise in COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations prompted Gov. Sisolak 
to scale back the state’s reopening plan.

The pandemic has crippled the tourism-driven Nevada economy. The state 
suffered historic unemployment rates at 30.1 percent in April and 25.3 
percent in May, before dropping to 15 percent in June following the 
reopening of the Vegas Strip.

However, the progress might be short-lived as COVID-19 cases rise – Nevada 
has been listed as a “red zone” in an internal document prepared by the 
nonprofit Center for Public Integrity for the White House Coronavirus 
Taskforce, according to the Review-Journal.

“We're always slower to recover than anyplace else because we depend on 
tourism. People have to have little money in their pocket to want to go on 
holiday,” Rep. Dina Titus (D-NV) told Fox News.

Stonebarger and many other small businesses are now left wondering if 
they’ll be able to survive a second shutdown.

“This one is just like hell; you may never reopen. You can just dwindle 
your savings. You can mortgage your house and still never be able to 
open,” Stonebarger told Fox News.

But the economic downturn in Nevada might prove to be a silver lining for 
President Donald Trump in a state that he narrowly lost in 2016 to Hillary 
Clinton. His campaign sees an opportunity to flip Nevada from blue to red 
by positioning Trump as the candidate who can rebuild the economy.

BIDEN TWEETS THAT OBAMA WH LEFT TRUMP ‘PLAYBOOK’ ON PANDEMICS, GRENELL 
RESPONDS

“If our economy is roaring by November, the president will be in 
spectacular shape. If it's not roaring, then the voters will still have to 
choose between two visions for Nevada and our country,” Adam Laxalt, 
former Nevada attorney general and current co-chair of Trump’s Nevada re-
election campaign. “This is one of the few presidential elections where we 
have two people on the ballot where you can actually see their record.”

The polls are mixed.

A recent national poll conducted by NBC News/WSJ has Trump trailing former 
Vice President Joe Biden by double-digits, however, a majority of voters 
still approve of Trump’s handling of the economy.

A Fox News poll conducted in January showed Biden leading Trump 47 percent 
to 39 percent in Nevada, however, since the pandemic, the Nevada 
Independent, citing findings from Democratic pollster John Anzalone 
between April 27-30 for a partisan group, shows the race much closer with 
Trump only trailing the presumptive Democratic nominee by 4 percent.

A Quinnipiac University poll between July 9-13 shows the former vice 
president and presumptive Democratic nominee with a 15 percentage point 
lead nationally, with Trump losing to Biden on the economy -- 50 percent 
to 45 percent.

“Obviously, he shouldn't be blamed for a virus that came in from a foreign 
country. I think people are going to be able to remember what the economy 
felt like heading into the coronavirus,” Laxalt said, adding that “if we 
want Nevada to come back, if we want Nevada's economy to be strong, we 
need a second term of President Trump.”

But Congresswoman Titus argues that Biden, not Trump has the experience to 
navigate Nevada and the country out of the recession.

“He helped us through the last big recession,” Rep. Titus said, referring 
to Biden’s role in overseeing the 2009 economic recovery for former 
President Barack Obama. “He was put in charge of the stimulus package when 
he was vice president. So, I think he can help us through this one as 
well. I just I feel like he's been there, he walked in our shoes and that 
he can get us out of this.”

TRUMP FIRES BACK AFTER OBAMA CLAIMS CREDIT FOR ECONOMIC BOOM: 'CON JOB'

Biden was tasked with overseeing the $787 billion economic stimulus 
package, to turnaround a free-falling economy during the 2008 recession.

Obama officials credit the legislation with jumpstarting the economy and 
setting the stage for the economic gains under the Trump Administration.

During the Obama administration, the unemployment rate fell steadily after 
reaching a high of 10 percent early in his first term.

Under the Trump administration, the stock market surged – it grew 31 
percent in the 807 trading days before Trump's election, but rose by 56 
percent in the 807 trading days after it, up through the third anniversary 
of Trump's inauguration this January, according to a Fox Business 
analysis.

Unemployment had continued to fall under Trump – dropping to 3.8 percent 
in February, among the lowest on record – before spiking as a result of 
the coronavirus,  which has infected 3.6 million Americans and killed more 
than 139,000.

In June, the country had an 11.1 percent unemployment rate and 17.8 
million people unemployed, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. 
However, in the week ending July 11, a total of 1.3 million Americans 
filed first-time claims for unemployment, marking the 17th week the number 
has surpassed 1 million. The jobless rate and the number of unemployed are 
up by 7.6 percentage points and 12.0 million, respectively, since 
February.

“We've seen no overall plan from this president, unlike Joe Biden, who put 
out a pretty thorough economic plan just in the last few days that 
included some health care reforms as well as economic reforms," Titus 
said.

BIDEN PUSHES POPULIST 'MADE IN AMERICA' PLAN TO PUMP UP ECONOMY

Earlier this month Biden released his “Build Back Better” plan to rival 
Trump’s “America First” agenda, which proposes $700 billion in spending on 
American products and research in hopes of bringing back millions of jobs 
in the aftermath of economic hardship imposed by the pandemic.

Trump laid out a vision for a potential second term during an interview 
with Fox News on July 10, telling Sean Hannity that after defeating 
coronavirus he will turn toward rebuilding the economy.

“We’re going to rebuild the economy. We’re going to bring back jobs from 
all these foreign lands that have stolen our jobs on horrible trade deals. 
We’re going to continue to make great trade deals,” Trump told Hannity 
during a phone interview.

TRUMP ENVISIONS BEATING CORONAVIRUS AND REBUILDING ECONOMY IN POTENTIAL 
SECOND TERM

Adding that, “We're going to have a great third quarter. We're going to 
have a great fourth quarter. And next year is going to be the best, I 
think is going to be one of the best years we've ever had."

Dr. Robert Lang, professor of urban affairs at the University of Nevada, 
Las Vegas, underscored the importance of the economy and how it translates 
at the ballot box being “typically one of the largest, if not the largest 
driver of an election.”

TRUMP DOWN 15 POINTS TO BIDEN IN LATEST NATIONAL POLL

But he noted the importance of the timing of the economic recovery, which 
could minimize the impact of a Trump rebound heading into November.

“The second quarter tends to be the one that really determines the 
outcome. You don't even know you vote in the fourth quarter. Technically, 
you don't even feel the third quarter. But you remember how it felt in the 
late spring of an election. And the country is not great in the late 
spring of this election.”

But Laxalt is confident in Trump’s chances, telling Fox News the campaign 
has “more people on the ground, more enthusiasm” than in 2016, and the 
“prospects are strong to be able to hold Nevada and flip it this cycle.”

Laxalt responded to concerns from Joshua Skaggs, former Nevada regional 
director for the Trump campaign, who in a letter to Republican National 
Committee Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel and obtained by the Nevada 
Independent, cited concerns that the president “will not prevail” in 
November and registration numbers are being “falsely inflated” to make the 
odds look more favorable than they actually are.

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“Obviously people complain on campaigns, that's been going on since the 
beginning of time. Some people think they know more than other people in 
campaigns. I've had that in my own campaigns, by the way, where you have 
individual people that feel like other people aren't going in the right 
direction,” Laxalt told Fox News.

And while the polls continue to show Biden in the lead, the campaign is 
not going to be caught off-guard like in 2016.

“That was a hard lesson to learn. We all thought Hillary was going to win 
that election. So we are not going to be complacent,” Titus said. “I think 
that Nevada will go blue, but we are doing everything to be sure that 
that's the case.”

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/trump-campaigns-push-nevada-as-covid19-
cripples-economy

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Trump campaign pushes for Nevada as COVID-19 cripples economy Alex Burns <bankrupt@nytimes.com> - 2020-07-18 07:05 +0000

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