10/24/18, 7:15 AM

Welcome to the latest in early voting in Nevada. Most of the data is in for four days as I write this. Bottom line of Tuesday: Dems won Washoe for fourth straight day, Dems won by double digits in Clark and the rural surge continued for the GOP (and 1,700 Nye absentees still not apportioned because county folks have not done so, SOS says).

Statewide with some rurals missing: 43-38, Dems, in early voting; 49-34, GOP, in absentees. Overall ballot lead for Dems: 5,200 (probably closer to 4,500 once the Nye Magical Mystery Ballots are counted).

So 10 percent of Clark voters already have turned out after four days — still triple raw votes of 2014 and more than double 2010, although the percentage is just a little higher than 2010 because of all the new voters. It’s also holding steady at just under three-quarters of what turnout was in 2016, which ordinarily would not be a valid comparison but this is some kind of hybrid (between midterm and presidential) election going on, it seems.

The Clark Dem firewall is at 10,000, which would be a just under 2 percent edge if turnout is 60 percent (reasonable guess at this point). An extrapolation says the edge could get to 30,000 — just under a third of the data is in and turnout usually spikes in the second week, so that is conservative. That would be 5 percent of early voting turnout IF it is 60 percent.

Remember:

2014: No firewall, GOP had edge in Clark

2010: 25,000-vote firewall, or 5.4 percent of Clark turnout. That was enough to save Harry Reid. But Sharron Angle is an apple to any orange.

2016, just for the heck of it: Clark firewall was 73,000, or 9.5 percent of turnout. So if this is going to be three-quarters of a presidential turnout, the lead should be about 7 percent, right? That would be 42,000, which is not impossible, but unlikely.

I assure you of this: If the Dems get to a 40,000 firewall in Clark, the Republicans will be worried. If they get to 35,000, both sides will not feel comfortable, but the Dems will feel better. Anything 30,000 or less probably means we are in for a long night, and the GOP machine in Clark will have done its job.

(All predicated on 60 percent turnout, which I will change if the early voting pattern does.)

—-This is not your grandfather’s Washoe County — whether your grandfather was Paul Laxalt or someone else. The Washoe numbers have to worry the GOP. The Dems didn’t win by as much Tuesday, but they still built their ballot lead. If the Democratic candidates hold their own or even win Washoe — Hillary Clinton did — that means the statewide GOP candidates have to really run up the score in the rurals and minimize losses in Clark. A 10 percent win in Clark is what Dems look for, as I have told you.

—-The rural numbers are impressive for the GOP, especially when you add absentees. So far (and some are not in yet and those 1,700 mystery absentees are not counted): 14,634 have voted early, 6,836 (!) by absentee, according to the SOS.

Early vote: 8,545, Repubs-3,811, Dems. That’s 58-26, more than 2-to-1, but not much different than reg advantage, which is 52-23. (It’s actually a slightly bigger lead because of the Nye Magical Mystery Ballots.) - Nevada Independent