Nevada Senate Race

CQ Politics Race Rating: Leans Democratic

Incumbent — Harry Reid (D); Running for re-election

Reid, after surviving close contests in his first three Senate elections, won by a breakout margin in 2004 and then gained national prominence in his current role as Senate majority leader. Reid thus should be in solid position to win again in 2010, with the Democrats coming off a strong 2008 Nevada campaign in which Democrat Barack Obama easily won the swing state for president and his party gained a 2-1 edge in the U.S. House delegation.

The political downside to holding a top legislative post, though, is that it also puts its holder in the thick of the Senate’s most contentious fights, and Reid’s job approval ratings back home have slipped to a degree that he looks vulnerable.

The state Republican Party has struggled to produce a top-tier challenger to Reid. The two Republicans widely regarded as the leading potential contenders — second-term Rep. Dean Heller of Nevada’s 2nd District and Jon Porter, who in 2008 lost the 3rd District seat he’d held for three terms — ruled out runs this summer.

Nonetheless, hypothetical matchups in recent polls have shown Reid trailing a couple of Republican candidates even though they are lesser-known to state voters: Danny Tarkanian, a Las Vegas real estate developer whose father, retired college basketball coach Jerry Tarkanian, led the University of Nevada at Las Vegas to the national men’s championship in 1990; and state Republican Party Chairwoman Sue Lowden, who served two terms in the state Senate in the 1990s.

Other declared or possible Republican primary contenders are state Sen. Mark Amodei; former state Rep. Sharron Angle, who lost to Heller in the 2006 GOP primary for the open 2nd District House seat; physician Robin Titus; John Chachas, a New York banker and native of Ely in rural Nevada; and Chuck Kozak, a Reno lawyer.

Any Republican who takes on Reid will have to pull together significant resources. He reported $12 million in campaign receipts as of Sept. 30 with $8.7 million remaining in the bank. That, in turn, enabled him to launch his first two campaign ads in mid-October, both positive spots focused on his efforts on behalf of his home state. He followed that at the end of the month with a new TV ad, which emphasized his effort to promote alternative energy development in Nevada, and another in mid-November that emphasized his clout in the Senate.

Reid campaign ads say they need to get an early start to re-introduce the senior senator to Nevada residents. This may sound peculiar, given Reid’s prominence as the leader of the Senate Democrats. But Nevada has been undergoing a population boom, and a third of the state’s electorate wasn’t living in Nevada when Reid last won re-election, without trouble, in 2004.

But Republican strategists believe whomever emerges as the GOP challenger will be able to rally financial support from around the country, and two party activists have formed a Dump Reid political action committee to aid in that effort.

Race Information

• Incumbent: Harry Reid, D
• First Elected: 1986 (4th term)
• Last Elected: 2004 (61.08%)
• Incumbent Status: Running for re-election
• CQ Politics Race Rating: Leans Democratic

State Information

• U.S. Senate Delegation: 1 Democrat, 1 Republican
• U.S. House Delegation: 2 Democrats, 1 Republican

Nevada's Other Senator

Sen. John Ensign-R

First Elected: 2000 (2nd term)

Last Elected: 2006 (55.36%)

State Offices

Governor: Jim Gibbons, R

First Elected: 2006 (1st term)

State House Control: Democratic

State Senate Control: Republican