Kirsten Searer

Renewable energy would be a huge boon in rural Nevada

LAS VEGAS - Nevada Democrats disputed Thursday that monthly voter registration numbers released by the secretary of state's office Wednesday represent a relative improvement of GOP voter registration efforts and predicted their advantage will increase in June.

Democrats' advantage in statewide registered voters has consistently risen in monthly numbers since 2006, except in months when Clark County's registrar of voters has purged their voter lists.  One such purge occurred last month, when both parties had thousands of voters taken off active voter lists.  In that purge, Nevada Democrats lost more than 20,000 voters compared to fewer than 15,000 Republicans.

"Every single week, except the week of the Clark County inactivation, Democrats have posted a net gain in terms of registration," said Kirsten Searer, executive director of the Nevada Democratic Party Thursday.  "However, even with this process Democrats have continued to post large net gains every week and we have essentially returned to pre-inactivation numbers."

U.S. Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz) in California last week.: Getty Images Photo.LAS VEGAS-Speaking in Denver today, Ariz. Sen. John McCain, the presumptive Republican nominee, backed away from his previously stated support for the Yucca Mtn. Nuclear Repository, proposing instead an "international repository for spent nuclear fuel."

"It is even possible that such an international center could make it unnecessary to open the proposed spent nuclear fuel storage facility at Yucca Mountain in Nevada," said McCain.

Nevada Democrats were quick to pounce on the potential policy shift, sending out a release accusing McCain of a nuclear waste flip-flop.

District is one of the top priorities for Democrats in Nevada and nationwide

Kirsten Searer, deputy executive director of the Nevada Democratic PartyEvery Monday, PolitickerNV.com profiles one of the staffers and consultants who work so hard to get these guys and gals elected and us something to write about. Today's subject: Kirsten Searer, deputy executive director of the Nevada Democratic Party.

LAS VEGAS-If you've been paying any attention to Nevada politics in the last year or so, you've certainly read a lucid quote by one-time Nevada Democratic communications director, now deputy executive director Kirsten Searer. Searer, 28, has been the voice of the party through the 2006 election and now the record-breaking 2008 caucuses, a job she couldn't have imagined holding a decade ago.

"I started studying journalism in high school and decided that was what I really wanted to do," said Searer. "My first exposé was on the cleanliness of our high school bathrooms."

LAS VEGAS-New voter registration numbers, released yesterday by the secretary of state's office, show that state Democrats have improved on the advantages they've gained in the last several months and are now in an even stronger position to pick up seats on the assembly, state senate and congressional levels.

Democrats, who had trailed Republicans in overall voter registration as recently as March of 2007, now have 441,676 active registered voters in Nevada as compared to 396,489 Republicans. Although both parties picked up voters, the Democratic advantage has swelled to 45,187 registrations, up from slightly more than 40,000 just a month ago.

"This is just an incredible shift in voter registration," said Kirsten Searer, deputy executive director of the Nevada Democratic Party, today. "The interesting thing about this is, at this point this isn't just caucus returns. For a long time, we were getting a boost because county registrars were going through the voter registration forms from the caucus. We're beyond that and we're still seeing a huge uptick in voter registration."

McCain coming to town during March Madness — but Nevadans know he worked to ban legal college betting

Today marks the fifth anniversary of the start of the Iraq war.  Poll after poll shows that Nevadans do not want to be mired in an endless civil war, yet John McCain — supported by Congressmen Jon Porter and Dean Heller — argues that American troops could be in Iraq for 100 years.

Las Vegas- Earlier today, the DCCC attacked Congressman Jon Porter’s vote against the Democrats’ nonbinding budget resolution, claiming that he “opposed tax cuts for middle class families by voting against a fiscally responsible budget.”  Now, the state Democratic Party has joined the fray, attacking Porter not for voting against the Democratic budget, but voting for the alternative budget resolution sponsored by President Bush.

“When push comes to shove,” the Nevada Democratic Party press release read, “Congressman Jon Porter doesn’t really support health care for uninsured kids.  Porter voted yesterday for President Bush’s fiscally irresponsible budget, which does nothing to help the estimated 113,000 Nevada kids who go without health care.”

President Bush speaks in Torrance, CA the day before he arrived in Las Vegas.: Getty Images PhotoLas Vegas- President Bush, after remarks to the Nevada Policy Research Institute Thursday morning, hosted a fundraiser for the Nevada Republican Party at a Summerlin residence owned by Sheldon Adelson, chairman of the Sands Corp.  The fundraiser was attended by more than 100 people and netted the party upwards of half a million dollars.

The fundraiser was proof that the president, whose job approval rating has languished in the mid-30s since late 2006, still packs a powerful punch among Republicans, particularly for raising money.