Transcript of What Happens in Vegas Could Decide the Election

From New York Times, I'm Michael Barbaro. This is The Daily. For millions of Americans, the housing crisis defines the US economy. In the swing state of Nevada, it could soon define the election. My colleagues, politics reporter, Jenny Medina, and daily producers Carlos Prieto and Claire Tennisgetter, traveled there to understand what happens when the of the American dream slips away. It's Monday, October 21st.

We are at the point in the election where there are so few days left that we're literally counting them down. As we do that, we are closing in here on the show on the issues that really seem to be driving and defining the election in the key swing states that will ultimately determine whether Donald Trump or Kamala Harris wins the White House. And, Jenny, you have been reporting out of Nevada. So just to begin with, put that state into the broader electoral picture for us.

We're in a coin flip election nationally, and Nevada really is a coin flip state. At this point, either party could win by just the slimmest of margins. And that's interesting because Democrats have really counted on Nevada for their wins for the last 20 years. The last Republican to win was George Bush in 2004. When Obama won in 2008, Nevada was a major victory for Democrats.

And has remained ever since. Basically, Democrats have never lost it since '04.

Right. A lot of Democrats thought that that heralded this future for them, that they were the party of diversity, that they were the party of the working class. In a lot of ways, no state epitomized that more than Nevada, where the overwhelming majority of voters do not have a college degree. There's a very large Hispanic population, and there's also a really significant Asian and Black population. For Democrats, it's a state that matters not only for its six electoral votes, but maybe even more so for its symbolism. It's also a place that Democrats worry about every single cycle because They keep eking out these wins, but by an increasingly shrinking margin.

Okay, and what does Nevada mean to Republicans in this moment?

Well, I think for Republicans, it's a lot of the same thing. There is this symbolism that it represents for them. Trump has spent a lot of time in Nevada, both this year and in the 2020 cycle, and he has a lot of devotees there. There's also this idea that's been percolating and we've seen for four years now of Trump making inroads with working class voters who are not white. Trump did well with many of these voters in 2020 and might do even better this time around. For Trump, If he wins this prize of Nevada, he'll be able to say, Look, I am helping us become the party of the working class. I am helping us become a more diverse party. You all criticize me for these things that I say and accuse me of being I'm racist, but I'm actually getting more of these voters who you thought were never possible.

Based on the time that you've spent there, what is the animating issue for voters in Nevada this year?

Without question, the animating issue is the economy. This is a place that has always had a lot of boom and bust cycles, but COVID completely obliterated the Las Vegas economy. It really hurt a lot of people, and we're still seeing the effects of that. When we talk about the economy, Now, what voters say first is housing, just how much it costs to live there.

Right. That doesn't necessarily surprise me because we've talked so much on the show about the nationwide housing crunch. Put simply, it's that there is not enough housing and the housing that exists is too expensive. What exactly is the picture of the housing problem in Vegas? I tend to think of it as a place actually with a tremendous amount of housing.

Right. Traditionally, Vegas has been exactly that. The thing to know about Las Vegas is that it was this sprawling place where people flocked to for their little slice of the American dream. It's really an exciting time for all of us here in the valley because of all those new developments, especially for home buyers. You can even see with this-It was a big expanse of desert. There were always new houses being built. Clark County coming in at number two on the list of the hottest zip codes across the country. And people could afford those houses without having a huge salary. As long as you get on the right websites and you find the right postings, you can find housing pretty much within a week. But during and after the pandemic, that really started to shift. A home buying frenzy happening now in Las Vegas. Local realtors say the pandemic has dramatically changed the local housing market. You had a lot of people moving in to Las Vegas. It's a gorgeous area. Everybody seems nice. It's a lot cheaper to live here than California. 150,000 people moved to Nevada from California alone.

Fascinating.

Housing prices in Las Vegas continue to skyrocket. So you had rents going up, interest rates going up, and all of a sudden, this place that was once affordable started to feel just like California, like the very places people were trying to leave.

Just how expensive does housing become in the When we're talking about the state, what we're really focusing on is Clark County, Vegas, and all the surrounding suburbs.

70% of the population of Nevada lives in Clark County. We're just trying to talk to people about their business and the economy in Las Vegas. Do you mind if we ask you a couple of questions? I've spent a lot of time over the last year talking with voters in Clark County.. A couple of weeks ago, I went back with Daily producers Carlos Prieto and Claire Tennis-Gedard to hear from voters about what the housing crisis has looked like. Do you mind if we ask you a couple questions?

And what did you find?

Two-bed room. It is $1,200 a month. So just last year, I was paying seven. Basically, everybody that you talk with will tell you a story about how much their rent has increased. And they'll explain that compared to what they were paying in 2019 or even 2021, their rent has effectively doubled or even tripled today. Do you remember what your rent, what they wanted to increase it to?

Almost three grand, I think. They had been around 1,300.

Remember five years ago, you could rent a house for $725. Okay. Now for a $1,200, all you can get is a studio. People talk about signing six-month leases and watching their rent go up at least $100 every six months.

How How much of your income goes to bills and rent, specifically?

Basically, all of it. Literally, all of it. People talk about looking for houses for months or even years on end and not being able to afford the down payment. Everybody has that story of housing wo.

Actually, when I got over here, I was very young, so I was able to worry hard with my ex-husband and buy a house. Now it's like, you can't do that.

We ended up visiting somebody who really typifies what a lot of people are going through in Las Vegas, who feels like that dream of Las Vegas has not materialized for him. It has not been a bridge to the middle class. Hi.

Hello.

Hi. How are you, Jenny? Nice to meet you. Nice to meet you. How are you? I'm good. Thank you so much. His name is Armando Garcia. He's 26 years old, and we met him at the rental home he shares with his partner, two roommates, and a few pets. We sat down in his living room, which is a very simple space. There's not a lot of decoration or furniture around. There's just a Dungeons & Dragons game on the coffee table. Remind me again, I know you told me, but I can't recall, how much do you pay for rent here, total?

The base rent is 2,000. And then water and trash can fluctuate from $200 to $400. And then electricity and gas, we pay separately from our rent. And that fluctuates even more.

And tell me a little bit about how hard it is or isn't to make rent?

It's been difficult. Currently at my job, I work $20 an hour plus commission, and my other roommates also work $16 an hour to $20 an hour. One of them works salary, and we're still struggling to keep up with our rent.

He started telling us about his life and this difficult housing saga he's been going through.

My dad's from Acapulco, and my mom's from Mexico.

Armando's parents are both from Mexico. They moved to San Diego, where he was born.

My family moved to Las Vegas in the summer of 2005. My uncle was opening up a sandwich shop, and he wanted my dad to help with the business, so we moved here.

When they first got there, Armando remembers it being a lot more difficult than his parents had hoped or expected it would be.

My dad was working as a cook, and then I remember my parents started cleaning banks at night.

They worked multiple jobs, and they were also constantly struggling to figure out how to pay the rent. But they kept encouraging him to try to do what they couldn't.

My parents were like, You should I tried to buy a house.

They kept saying, even from the time he was a teenager, Armando, buy a home, buy a home. You can do it. Buy a home.

Then Eventually, I moved out.

Then he decides to move out of his parents house and in with roommates.

Then I started working at the call center, which was $16 an hour.

He has what he describes as a pretty decent paying job.

That was insane.

He feels like it's pretty stable.

I had the ability to make a savings.

He thinks he might be able to put enough money away to actually be able to do what his parents keep encouraging him to do, to buy a home.

But then COVID happened.

But then the pandemic comes.

He's working on a pizza delivery job.

And he shuffles through a couple of jobs.

And the apartment, they increase the rent every single month.

And at the same time, his rent keeps going up higher and higher each month, and the bills feel further and further out of reach.

And then I had to use my credit cards more so that I would have cash.

So he's living paycheck to paycheck and racking up debt.

I got to the point where I was like, I'm not paying my credit cards. I'm just keeping the money that I have to pay for food and rent.

And this keeps going on for a while. Eventually, he and his roommates move from the apartment to a house to save a little bit of money, but he's still barely making ends meet. Then earlier this year, things change really quickly and a lot starts to unravel.

Three of us had lost our jobs, and we all had to find jobs within two weeks.

He loses a job and is without a paycheck for two weeks. For him and for his roommates, that's really catastrophic. They fell behind on rent very quickly.

They took us to eviction court.

Their landlord took them to eviction court. They come back with an eviction order.

Then we just had a week.

They're all really preparing to have to leave the home.

We put everything in storage.

It's really scary for them. He tried to comfort one of his roommates who was just really freaked out and panicking, thinking that she might be either couchsurfing or living in her car.

I remember every day for two weeks, I had to hold her while she cried. She could not imagine what a future would look like where we were homeless. It ended up being where I had to borrow $1,000 from my mom, $1,000 from my uncle to make three months of rent for ourselves.

They barely escape eviction. Really, the only way they managed to do so is because Armando cobbles together some small loans from two different family members. But Armando is really shaken. He's gone from thinking a few years ago that it was for him to buy a house to now realizing that he's in just as a precarious position or an even more precarious position than his parents were ever in.

To the degree that the American dream has always been grounded in this idea that you will do better than your parents, this has to be exceptionally disillusioning.

Yes. That dream that he had inherited from his parents of buying a house has completely vanished. Do you want to move out to your own place with your partner at some point? Is that a dream?

It'd be nice, but I think the dream of having my own home is not a dream I've had since I was 21.

Why not?

Because I think it just feels too bold to have that dream. I could dream, and in the dream, hypothetically, we're stable enough to own it. But what always dampens the daydream is that to me now it just feels unrealistic. It doesn't feel like I can daydream about it for very long because it just feels like I have realism around me all the time.

In a lot of ways, his story might sound extreme, but it's really not that unique. We spoke to a local real estate agent in Vegas who grew up there and had seen all of this up He said that for most people who work in Las Vegas without a college degree, what used to be attainable, what used to be very possible, no longer is. You just can't get what your parents might have been able to get 10 or 20 years ago. This is what is infuriating many people who live in Las Vegas and have lived here for years. There are people all over Las Vegas and other parts of the country who are really struggling with this basic idea of making rent or finding a place to live for good. Even parents who I speak with who own a home worry constantly that their kids won't have a place to live. It's a really basic thing that we often take for granted, but that many people are now struggling with more than before. For those people, they're looking at this presidential election through the lens of a housing crisis. They're not worried about anything else to the degree that they are worried about finding a place to live comfortably and stably.

What they want to know is, how can you address this? Are you going to do anything to change my basic experience of living in America? Can you possibly restore my faith in the American dream, even? Because I think when you don't have a stable place to live, it really shatters your faith in that. It really makes you question what the government is doing and what safety and stability there is in this country. That's a real challenge that Donald Trump and Kamala Harris face in making their case to voters right now. They're trying to navigate this level of frustration and distrust in two very different ways.

We'll be right back. So, Jenny, given the dynamics that you just outlined, how has the presidential race, the campaign, played out in Nevada?

There is absolutely no ignoring the presidential campaign in Nevada.

Their Bidenomics led to the highest inflation in 40 years.

Everywhere you go, any restaurant you're in where there is a TV on, you see an ad from one candidate or another. Extremists are attacking abortion rights. Kamala is for they/them. President Trump is for you. There are billboards everywhere, every radio station. We need Kamala Harris. You're going to be fed some political app. Kamala Harris is approved. I'm Donald J. Trump, and I approve this message. The candidates have come in and out of the state multiple times. Good evening, Nevada. Hello, Las Vegas. Hello, Las Vegas. Every single time they come, they're there to talk about the economy. We had the greatest economy in history. For Donald Trump, he has really hammered home the message that this is Democrats It's its fault. People are saying to themselves, Were we better off four years ago or are we better off now? And it wasn't even close. That any economic pain you are feeling is because something that Democrats did or did not do. We also need to build more housing in America. And Harris, for her part, has been a little bit more specific. So we will cut the red tape and work with the private sector to build 3 million new homes.

She has gone out there and given speeches a couple of times talking about how much more housing needs to be built. Provide first-time home buyers with $25,000 down payment assistance. About tax credits and more specific ideas of how she can try to help change the situation.

Harris is more explicitly talking about housing in a state where, based on your reporting, housing is the driving issue. Is that disparity in how the two candidates' focus on housing mattering? How are voters generally responding to these two competing messages?

Of course, like in every other state, there are people who are just viewing this in the same way they always have in a partisan lens. There are the people who voted for Trump and will stick with him again. There are people who voted for Biden and are sticking with Harris. But there's a small group of people who are not really tuning into this until right now who are undecided, and they are the people who will matter the most on election day.

The Covited Persuadable Voter.

Absolutely. The Persuadable Voter. In Las Vegas, that typically means a non- College-educated voter Most likely Black or Latino, and most likely living paycheck to paycheck. After talking to dozens of these voters in the last several weeks, I think about them as in three different buckets.

What are those buckets?

The first group of those voters are people who describe themselves as progressives who have been long-time committed Democrats but now feel like the party has abandoned them and are considering voting for some third-party candidate by writing somebody in. I think Armando, who couldn't afford his rent anymore, he describes himself in just that way. Are you voting in this year's election?

I am.

Can I ask you about who you plan to vote for and why?

It's It's difficult. I'd like to vote for the Green Party.

Armando says there's a tiny chance he might change his mind and vote for Harris.

Like a 2% chance.

But if the election were today, he would write in Jill Stein or somebody else and take a very ideologically committed vote and hope for some political revolution, so to speak.

These are voters who it seems, are ready to cast a protest vote against the entire system, Democratic and Republican.

That's not really that surprising in Nevada. Remember, this is where Bernie Sanders won in the 2020 Democratic caucus, but it's also the smallest group of these voters.

What is the second group?

The second group is what you might think of as Trump Turners. These are mostly people who voted for Obama in the past but felt like his promises of hope and change and the democratic promise of hope and change has basically been empty for them. There's a lot of this sense of what we face now is worse. We are worse off. We're going in the wrong direction, and maybe we should just go back to what we had under the Trump administration. Do you mind if I ask you a couple of questions? That's okay, but I just spoke too much English. It's fine if If you want to answer me in Spanish, that's fine, too. For example, we met a woman named Kenya who was selling herbal supplements, and she voted for Joe Biden in 2020. But she's seen her family financially. She says a lot of her family members have been looking for a home for a while and just can't afford to buy one. She thinks, Look, maybe Trump is the better businessman who can make her bottom line feel better. Then we went to a baseball field where I had been just a month before, and at that time had spoken to a lot of voters who were undecided.

But this time, I was surprised by how many people there were very enthusiastically voting for Trump. I'm a Trump supporter. What do you all like about him? What do you see?

He's a businessman. You get to run a country like a business.

So who are you What are you voting for in the fall? Probably Trump.

I'm voting for Trump.

Everybody hates me when I say this, but I would personally vote for Trump. Yeah. And ask him you're voting for? Trump. You're voting for Trump? Yes. Okay. I prefer Trump over what we have. Okay.

Basically, they want change. In Trump's message of a broken system that he says he will repair, it sounds like they're finding that change.

Right, exactly.

Jenny, what's the third group of these persuadable voters?

The third group of voters are the most interesting to me. Maria, can I ask you a little bit about politics? Will you vote in November?

I won't this time.

I didn't plan on voting. To be honest with you- I don't think I will vote. You don't I think you will vote. No. And those are people who have voted in the past or who- What does that mean, Maria? We think about voting. I'm tired of it all. I'm just burnt out. But say this time, they are just not going to vote at all. I am a Democrat. Same garbage, different package. Democrats and Republicans, they don't do nothing no more for us. We met those people at a swap meet. We met them at grocery stores. I felt like no matter who we vote for, they're going to choose who they want to choose, to be honest. That just how I felt. And I've met them again and again over months going to Nevada.

I just promise things I will say. It's not that I expect to fix the world in one night or one day, but it's like I don't see anything. I don't see nothing coming out for us.

These are people who have voted for Democrats in the past but feel like the system just isn't working and just don't see the point anymore. Just don't feel like there's any reason to do what they've done in the past, and sitting out is their form of protest.

A different form of protest than Armando, for example.

Right. A different form of protest. They just feel frustrated and want to voice this frustration. Is it fair to say that you're not voting because you're angry?

No, I'm not angry. I'm disappointed. I'm disappointed. Yeah. Angry? No.

I'm not angry. I mean, Jenny, what you're really describing here in all of these encounters you had with voters in Nevada is a profound cynicism, right? It feels deeply connected to their eroding economic circumstances, primarily housing, but it sounds like not just housing. And by and large, what you're finding would seem to generally cut against the Democrats.

Yes, absolutely. I think what I have found over the last several months in Nevada over this entire year is just a really profound sense of cynicism that is essentially defining the electorate There is so much anger over the economy and so much a feeling of broken promises. People feel very, very frustrated and very, very hopeless. It hurts people's day-to-day lives. What they thought Vegas was supposed to mean for them, what Vegas meant to their families, what Vegas meant for the possibilities, all seems to have evaporated. They lay that, fairly or not, at the feet of Democrats.

There's a case to be made that rather than this being a Biden-Harris Democratic Party problem, just based on the fact that they are the incumbent administration, that this cynicism is something that Democrats are struggling with and have been struggling with for a really long time because the Democratic Party does see itself as the party of institutional solutions. Going all the way back to the New deal, up through Obamacare. If you are a cynical voter inclined to distrust the government as the vehicle for solving your problem, then the Democratic brand is one you're very likely to be wary of. It's a whole lot easier to run against the system. Who has better mounted a campaign against the system than Donald Trump?

I think it's important to remember that many of these voters once believed in that system. They really believed that government, in fact, they might still believe that government was supposed to have a positive impact in their lives, but they don't feel like it has. That's the promise that they feel is broken. That's what's leading them to their cynicism. You say that government is supposed to work for me, and I don't actually see that coming true. You say that government is supposed to improve my life and my children's life. And in fact, I feel like my children are going to be worse off than I am. That overwhelming feeling of things aren't going to get better, things aren't getting better. This feeling of giving up, of thinking, I keep trying and trying and it's not getting better. So what do I have to lose by just blowing up the system? And in Nevada, working class voters, voters without a college degree and Latino voters are some of the fastest growing segments of voters overall. And if those voters have become so cynical that they decide to blow up the system, it could mean that Trump wins the state.

That's completely emblematic of what we see going on nationally, of Latino voters voicing frustration over the Democratic Party, of working class voters voicing frustration over the Democratic Party, of this feeling the American dream might be out of reach for people that once really had a possibility. If that cynicism becomes a defining feature of this year's election, it will be a big part of what could hand the White House to Donald Trump.

Well, Jenny, thank you very much.

Thank you. We'll be right back.

Here's what else you need to know today. Over the weekend, any hope that the death of Hamas's leader might help end the region's war quickly evaporated. In Israel, a drone from Lebanon crashed near the private residence of Israel's Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, raising the possibility that Hezbollah sought to target him. In Lebanon, Israel claimed its airstrikes had killed three Hezbollah commanders. And in Gaza, Palestinian authorities said that a major Israeli airstrike had killed or wounded dozens of people. And North Carolina has become the second battleground state to set a record on the first day of early voting. Residents of the state cast more than 350,000 ballots on Thursday and another 150,000 on Friday. Earlier last week, first day voting records were also shattered in Georgia. Today's episode was It was introduced by Carlos Prieto, Claire Tennis-Sketter, and Rob Zypko. It was edited by M. J. Davis Lynn, Ben Calhoun, and Brenda Clinkenberg. Contains original music by Marion Lozano, Alishaba Itup, Pat McCusker, and Dan Powell, and was engineered by Alyssa Moxley. Our theme music is by Jim Brunberg and Ben Lansberg of WNDERLY. That's it for the Daily. I'm Michael Barbar. See you tomorrow.