EDITORIAL: Nevada U.S. Senate race could determine control

Democrats face long odds this year to keep their slim majority in the U.S. Senate. Most of the 33 seats up for re-election are in Democratic hands, and the party controls nine of the 10 seats that pundits believe are most likely to flip.

Nevada — where incumbent Democrat Sen. Jacky Rosen faces a challenge from Republican Sam Brown — is home to one of those vulnerable seats.

Mr. Brown is a West Point graduate who served his nation in Afghanistan, earned a Purple Heart and has the scars to show it. Upon leaving the military, he earned an MBA from Southern Methodist University and began a business that provides emergency pharmaceutical support for veterans. He chose to run for office because “people are hurting and people need leadership.”

Mr. Brown tabs Bidenomics as a primary cause of the economic malaise gripping many voters. He describes himself as a “fan of free-market” policies — including “lower taxes and less regulation” — who will address constituent concerns about “economic hardship and financial strain.” Mr. Brown believes Democrats in recent years have made “it harder to attain the American Dream.”

He blames rising housing prices on White House spending bills that triggered inflation and drove the Federal Reserve to increase interest rates, making it more expensive for buyers to take out a mortgage. He also wants the federal government to release more land in Nevada “that allows for long-term growth.”

His military background provides Mr. Brown with a unique perspective on a world awash in conflict. He supports efforts to contain Vladimir Putin and Russia in Ukraine — “We need to maintain a leadership position in the world” — and is a staunch supporter of Israel. He calls the Biden administration’s Middle East policy “beyond a tragedy,” noting that “Iran has been allowed … to go from being nearly broken and ineffective to fighting proxy wars against Israel.”

If elected, Mr. Brown says he would support policies that promote law and order and encourage job growth and economic prosperity, providing Americans with a means for advancement. “I understand the hardship, the challenges that people are under when we have leadership that failed,” he said.

Meanwhile, Sen. Rosen is wrapping up an unremarkable first term. Her campaign emphasizes her claim to be a “moderate,” yet she was a staunch supporter of the economic policies that brought the country 9 percent inflation — the highest in nearly 40 years — and $5 a gallon gasoline at the pump, decimating middle- and lower-class families. Despite donning the banner of bipartisanship, she voted with the Biden administration 93 percent of the time during the first two years of the president’s term, according to the website FiveThirtyEight.

If Democrats take control of Congress and Kamala Harris wins the Oval Office, expect Sen. Rosen to jettison her “moderate” facade and support a host of extreme policies that remake the nation’s traditions and institutions in service to a radical progressive agenda. That would include an end to the filibuster, packing the Supreme Court, rewriting the First Amendment to regulate campaign speech and mandating compulsory unionism.

A spokesman for Sen. Rosen said she wouldn’t “be participating in the Review-Journal’s endorsement process” and would not commit to an in-person interview or provide responses to written questions from the paper’s editorial page on issues such as abortion limits, statehood for Washington, D.C., right-to-work laws, the Supreme Court and the filibuster. She has a right to associate with whom she pleases. But her constituents deserve better — much better. If Sen. Rosen recoils from the challenge of defending her record or explaining her positions to Nevadans on a number of vital issues, she lacks the attributes of an effective and capable elected official and should find another line of work.

We urge Nevadans to support Sam Brown for the U.S. Senate.

The views expressed above are those of the Las Vegas Review-Journal.