County Clerk Lisa Lloyd views the results as official ballot checkers await the tallies of the primary election in Lincoln County on Tuesday evening. Lloyd reported a low number of voter turnouts for this year’s polls. (Rachel Williford photo)
Voter turnout was low in Lincoln County for the primary election June 10, as it was around pretty much all of the state.
Only 531 (19.84 percent) of the total 2,676 registered voters in the county came out on Election Day. 239 ballots were cast in early voting, and 40 by absentee ballot for an overall total of 810 (30.25 percent).
In the Republican race for County Assessor, Mark Holt outpolled Collin Bleak 373 to 163. He will now face incumbent Democrat Melanie McBride in the November 4 general election. Summer Pearce received 35 votes, although she had withdrawn from the race, but after the deadline for having her named removed from the ballot.
All other local candidates in the primary ran unopposed. Teresa Hansen, Hospital District A, 693: Carolyn Harr, Hospital District B, 689; Joseph “Ty” Mizer, Hospital District C, 678; Dixie Scarboro, Hospital District E, 662; Wade Poulsen, School Board Trustee, District E, 663; Kerry Lee, Sheriff, 738; Steve Dobrescu, District 7 Court Judge, Dept. 1, 696; Gary Fairman, District 7 Court Judge, Dept. 2, 702.
In statewide races of interest, Gov. Brian Sandoval easily defeated four challengers in the state Republican primary with nearly 90 percent of the vote. He tallied 105,826 votes and advances to the general election in November, where he’ll face little-known Democrat challenger Robert Goodman.
State Sen. Mark Hutchison won a hard-fought GOP primary against Sue Lowden, 62,920 to 42,280 to move on as the Republican candidate for lieutenant governor in November.
Las Vegas State Assemblywoman Lucy Flores was the runaway winner in the Democratic primary for Lt. Gov. with 52,305 votes.
Incumbent Lt. Gov. Brian Krolicki is prevented for running for a third term by Nevada Constitution term limit laws.
Flores might be quite a success story in her own right. In 1994, she was a student at the Caliente Youth Center, before finishing high school, then going on to USC, and earning her law degree from UNLV. She was a featured speaker at the July 2012 50th Anniversary of the facility.
And, in what could become a first in Nevada politics, the early lead choice among Democratic voters in the eight-way primary for governor was “None Of These Candidates.” In the final count though, the winner was Las Vegas candidate Bob Goodman, a former Nevada economic development official who served under the late Gov. Mike O’Callaghan.
A similar thing was seen in the Democratic race for lieutenant governor, where Flores was running, “None of These Candidates” garnered 11,508 votes, including 40 from Lincoln County.
Also on the November ballot in the state governor’s race will be Independent American candidate David VanDerBeek.
Republican Assemblyman Cresent Hardy won Tuesday’s hottest congressional primary, District 4, one of the largest in the nation, beating his tea party challenger Niger Innis by about 10 percentage points. The vote was Hardy 10,396, Innis 9,076, and Mike Monroe 5,392.
Innis did better than Hardy in five of the seven counties in the district, including Lincoln where he won 235-194. Innis’ best showing was in Mineral County, where he won 181 to 90.
However, his loss came from Clark County, where Hardy had nearly a 2,700-vote margin, 8,203 to 5,514
The Democratic incumbent, freshman U.S. Rep. Steven Horsford, D-Nev., easily defeated his little known primary opponent, Mark Budetich, by nearly 80 percentage points in the 4th Congressional District. Horsford will face Hardy in the Nov. 4 general election.
