Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto’s (D-NV) Republican challenger, former state Attorney General Adam Laxalt, wants you to know that he’s at peace with the fact that more than a dozen of his own family members have openly backed his rival.
Laxalt, an election denier who served as co-chair of the Trump campaign in Nevada, declared on Wednesday evening that he was unruffled by the joint endorsement 14 of his own relatives had put out for Cortez Masto earlier in the day, claiming that those relatives were already Democrats – “most” of them, anyway.
“It’s not surprising that once again a handful of family members and spouses, half of whom do not live in Nevada, and most of whom are Democrats, are supporting a Democrat,” the GOP candidate tweeted.
“They think that Nevada & our country are heading in the right direction,” he continued. “I believe Nevadans don’t agree with the Biden/[Cortez] Masto agenda of high gas prices, soaring inflation, rising crime, and an open border.”
His relatives’ three-page endorsement, which did not mention Laxalt, praised Cortez Masto as having “Nevada grit.”
“Her entire career is not a simple ‘sound-bite’ that merely speaks of supporting Nevada,” they said. “Rather, her entire career demonstrates years of bold actions that she has taken as an authentic advocate of Nevada.”
It’s not the first time Laxalt’s family members have publicly spoken out against one of his runs for office: In 2018, a dozen of them penned an op-ed in the Reno Gazette-Journal tearing into his (ultimately doomed) gubernatorial bid. Most of those same relatives also signed off on the Cortez Masto endorsement.
However, another 22 of Laxalt’s relatives put out an opposite column boosting the then-gubernatorial hopeful.
The Nevada Senate election is one of the most competitive races in the 2022 midterm cycle, one that’s key in Democrat and Republicans’ tug-o-war over the Senate.
