Las Vegas, NV (AP) – One week after Election Day, Republican Adam Laxalt conceded the race for one of Nevada’s Senate seats to incumbent Democrat Catherine Cortez-Masto, issuing statements saying that he won’t contest the result but calling mail-in balloting a “tactic” that tilted the balance.
“I am confident that any challenge of this election would not alter the ultimate outcome,” GOP candidate Adam Laxalt said in a tweet that campaign adviser Robert Uithoven confirmed was authentic.
Laxalt told the AP more than a year ago that he was preparing legal challenges to the outcome of the 2022 election. In his Twitter statement and a separate email sent Tuesday to supporters, he complained that “Republican turnout on Election Day was significantly lower than expected as we needed to overcome nearly three weeks of Democrat-favored mail-in voting.”
“Nevada’s new elections laws enacted two years ago allowed for massive ballot harvesting and votes dropped off at drop boxes and polling places on Election Day,” Laxalt said in the email. “Republicans will either have to fix our election laws or better adjust to them and to the tactics used against us.”
He said mail-in voting “is not a form of voting Republican voters prefer, so as those ballots were tabulated, they skewed heavily towards Democrats up and down the ballot, including our opponent.”
Uithoven characterized the tweet as a brief public statement and said the email “provided a little more detail” to Laxalt’s supporters.
Nevada’s vote count took several days partly because the Legislature in 2020 adopted a law requiring counties to accept ballots postmarked by Election Day if they arrive up to four days later. Laxalt had an early lead that dwindled after late-counted ballots came in from the state’s population centers in Las Vegas and Reno.
Cortez Masto’s win, along with Democratic Sen. Mark Kelly’s victory in Arizona, gave Democrats a 50-49 edge in the Senate.
Along with Vice President Kamala Harris’ tiebreaking vote, the party will retain control of the chamber no matter the result of next month’s Georgia runoff between Democratic Sen. Raphael Warnock and Republican candidate Herschel Walker.
Cortez Masto was considered the most vulnerable Democratic senator in the midterm elections, and the Republican Party had high hopes of flipping the seat.
“I entered this arena for my family and those all over Nevada and America who believe our country is headed in the wrong direction,” Laxalt, an attorney, said in his statements on Tuesday. He said he will “return to private life and private practice.”
“This race and the 2022 election cycle didn’t go as we hoped,” he said, “but I am proud of the race that we ran.”