Amodei steps up as Krolicki bows out of special election
Republicans lost perhaps more than they realize last week when Lt. Gov. Brian Krolicki announced he would not be a candidate in the special election for the 2nd Congressional District.
Krolicki is a four-time winner in statewide elections, and always by large margins. He’s well-known in the district, perhaps more so than any other candidate besides Sharron Angle, who lacks Krolicki’s habit of winning.
But Krolicki’s explanation — family considerations and commitment to his current job made him unable to run — should be taken at face value, for at least two reasons.
First, Krolicki is term-limited, blocked from running for re-election in 2014 when his term expires. Gov. Brian Sandoval will presumably seek a second term that year, Nevada will have no U.S. Senate race and, depending on who finally wins the Northern Nevada congressional seat in 2012, a run for Congress would likely entail a Republican primary. Saying no to Congress now means — at the very least — a two-year break from politics.
Second, Krolicki could have waited to learn the outcome of a lawsuit filed by the Republican Party against Secretary of State Ross Miller. Miller ruled the special election will be a “free for all,” in which multiple candidates (even of the same political party) can run. The GOP, however, insists a party central committee should be able to pick a single nominee.
(And if the party could choose a nominee, it would undoubtedly have been Krolicki.)
Although it’s unlikely the Republicans will win that lawsuit, Krolicki had nothing to lose by waiting, and much to gain. For example, the lawsuit will most likely be decided after the end of the 2011 Legislature, freeing him to campaign. And, on the outside chance that it did persuade justices, a party-nomination process would certainly have favored him.
On the other hand, if family considerations were keeping him out of the race, then saying so now allows other candidates to emerge and run stronger races. So Krolicki ended his political aspirations, at least for now.
Which brings us to the next person who must be considered a front-runner, former state Sen. Mark Amodei. A lawyer with a dry wit and quick mind, Amodei is currently the chairman of the state Republican Party. He’ll quit that job in order to seek the congressional seat.
Amodei tackles what he sees as his opponents’ main line of attack head-on: In 2003, he was co-author of a tax increase. He freely confesses that, after helping to kill then-Gov. Kenny Guinn’s preferred gross receipts tax in the state Senate, he felt it his obligation to answer critics who charged he had no ideas of his own to fix the state’s revenue problem.
Embracing 12 different types of taxes, the plan (proposed with Democrat Terry Care) would have placed a sales tax on services that cost more than $50, increased room taxes, gambling taxes, cigarette and alcohol taxes and added an unemployment insurance tax surcharge.
But, Amodei noted, it would also have imposed a spending cap, at a time long before the tea party drew attention to the issue.
“The fight was over gross receipts,” Amodei said. “This [the Care-Amodei plan] was a reasoned, public, transparent process.”
It’s still going to dog him on the campaign trail, especially with tax-hater Angle in the race. Even his anti-tax votes in 2009 and his ability to say he voted against both budget and taxes — so as not to spend money the state didn’t have — will be of little help persuading single-issue voters.
But with Krolicki out, and Angle being, well, Angle, Amodei is now the Republicans’ best shot at winning and keeping this seat.
Steve Sebelius is a Review-Journal political columnist and author of the blog SlashPolitics.com. His column appears Sunday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday. Reach him at 702-387-5276 or ssebelius@ reviewjournal.com.
