Lahontan Valley News
August 3, 2016
In one fleeting moment of her U.S. Senate campaign in Nevada, Democrat Catherine Cortez-Masto’s team dropped the ball … and that was no earthquake we heard.
Cortez-Masto, who is running for the seat currently held by Harry Reid, made a swing through the Silver State last week, but very few knew about her campaign stops … particularly most media outlets.
Her campaign handlers didn’t want the press — and the public — to know she was stopping in communities such as Ely, Elko, Winnemucca and Fallon. It was only by a fluke that the Elko and Lovelock newspapers, for example, learned of her whirlwind stop. Cortez-Masto traveled across Nevada to kick off her Middle Class Tax Cut Tour. Her press team, hardly a neutral source for disseminating information, wrote most news accounts.
The Elko Daily Free Press learned of her stop — only by accident — when a member of the local Democratic Party notified the newspaper without the blessing of her staff. The Daily Free Press then initiated emails with the Cortez-Masto camp to obtain more details. According to the newspaper’s editor, the information provided to him had the wrong day so the Daily Free Press had to hunt down the correct information.
Likewise, the Humboldt Sun in Winnemucca never received notification of her stop as did the editor of the Ely Times. A member of the Lovelock Democrats — not anyone from Cortez-Masto’s team — notified that town’s newspaper of the event, and as a result, a reporter attended her greet and meet.
The LVN learned of her tour on Thursday, the same day of her stop in Fallon. The LVN made a few calls afterward and learned the Cortez-Masto camp told local Democrats, some of the finest people anyone would meet, they did not want the LVN to attend her event. Their answer to them was a resounding NO.
We find this disturbing that a candidate for the U.S. Senate would want to shun the press from her stops across Nevada. What is even more disturbing, her actions are also shutting the door on many Nevadans who may have wanted to hear her plan on the $1,000 tax cut.
Read More: http://www.nevadaappeal.com/news/opinion/23219586-113/editorial-cortez-mastos-ill-fated-trip-to-rural-nevada
