Four of the top five official contributors to Nevada state legislative campaigns in 2024 were directly connected to casinos. Other notable contributors include workers’ unions, political action committees, and other companies.
According to campaign finance reports submitted to and published by Nevada’s Secretary of State, over $4 million was given to the 92 candidates for Nevada’s state legislature represented by the two major American political parties in 2024.
Caesars Entertainment gave the most to legislative campaigns, donating a total $128,000 to candidates from multiple variations of three different names (Caesars Entertainment, Caesars Enterprise Services, and Caesars) and two different addresses.
UNLV assistant professor of political science Kenneth Miller told The Nevadan News in April that while candidates also pass policy for their constituents who did not give them money, where candidates got their money from is “a good predictor of how they’re going to act in office.”
“Politicians pay attention to their donors,” Miller said in April. “Where their money came from was a good predictor of how they were going to act in office. That’s not to say that there’s quid pro quo sorts of corrupt practices going on. It’s simply that those are the people they listen to, the ones who funded their campaigns.”
The average given to state legislative campaigns in 2024 was $6,078.75 and the median was only $1,500. Most contributors only gave $500 to one candidate each, and those small donors largely were made up of private citizens.
Only three contributors gave at least $100,000 to state legislative candidates I’m 2024 and all of them were connected to casinos. Other than Caesars, The Nevada Resort Association, Marnell Architecture, and South Point Hotel and Casino each spent at least $100,000 on candidates for Nevada’s legislature.
The Nevada Resort Association, which describes itself as “primary advocacy voice for Nevada’s gaming and resort industry” on its website, gave candidates $110,500 in 2024. Marnell Architecture, who worked with multiple casinos including the M Resort, Bellagio, and Harrah’s, donated $100,000 to candidates in 2024. South Point also donated $100,000 to candidates for the state legislature.
Other notable casino donors include Las Vegas Sands Corp., which gave candidates $84,000, and Golden Entertainment, whose casinos include the Strat and Pahrump Nugget, which gave candidates $65,000 in 2024.
Many of the other major contributors include political action committees, which are political committees organized for raising and spending money to elect and defeat political candidates according to opensecrets.org,
PACs gave much more money to Nevada’s national legislative candidates than those at the state level in 2024. Miller said to The Nevadan in April that the committees, specifically Super PACs, are often tools for “wealthy individuals and corporate interests” to give money to campaigns when they can’t do so through corporations. Nevada allows state candidates to accept donations directly from corporations, but that is illegal at the federal level.
But PACs still paid Nevada legislative campaigns in 2024. The political action committee who paid state legislative candidates the most is the Nevada Justice Association’s PAC, Citizens for Justice, which gave candidates a total of $87,000. The Nevada Subcontractor Association PAC and Nevada Conservation Leadership PAC each gave $68,500 to candidates.
Multiple workers’ unions also spent large sums of money donating to state legislative races in 2024. The International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers spent more than any other union on campaigns in Nevada at $75,000. The Nevada branch of the Service Employees International Union gave candidates $$61,500, and the International Union of Operating Engineers spent $38,500 on state campaigns.
Other notable contributors to Nevada’s state legislative candidates include Zuffa, the parent company of the UFC, and PhRMA, the Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America. Zuffa gave state candidates $56,000, and the UFC’s president, Dana White, gave candidates $45,000. PhRMA gave state legislative candidates $67,000.
Many campaign contributors donated money to Nevada legislative candidates from outside of the state, as 189 of the 780 listed contributors had addresses outside of Nevada in the contribution records from Nevada’s secretary of state.
Despite the top contributors, only 18 donors gave more than $50,000 to Nevada’s legislative candidates, and 120 of the 780 contributors who gave money contributed at least $10,000, which is the most one donor is allowed to give to one campaign, according to Nevada state statutes.
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Mark Credico is an independent journalist working in Southern Nevada. He covers subjects including government accountability, homelessness, workers' unions and the environment.
