News - October 18, 2024 - by Ray Hagar

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Could challenger Greg Kidd get things accomplished in Congress without being a member of the Republican or Democratic parties?

That question sparked the biggest disagreement between Kidd and incumbent Republican Mark Amodei during Day 2 of the Nevada Newsmakers debate between the candidates for Nevada's 2nd U.S. House District seat.

Kidd, running in his first congressional election, is not affiliated with any party although he briefly joined the Republican Party when he moved to Lake Tahoe permanently in 2020.

He is running as a non-partisan candidate. On the ballot, NPP is next to his name, or No Political Party.

Kidd, a successful financial/technology investor, told host Sam Shad, and Mark Robison, the political reporter for the Reno Gazette-Journal, that his time working for the Federal Reserve gave him experience of how to influence electors and get things done in Congress despite having no political party to back him up.

"This isn't my first trip to the rodeo, so, I mean, my time in Washington, DC, in public service started back around the time of 9-11," Kidd said. "And the Fed in those days, as everyone knows, the Fed is non-partisan. It was created by the government, but it's not part of the government. And so we got a bunch of Democrats and Republicans running around the halls there."

Nevada's 2nd U.S. House District has 187,409 registered non-partisan voters as of September of 2024, according to the Nevada Secretary of State. The congressional district has roughly 36,000 more registered non-partisans than Democrats.

"We're very good at working with both sides, and we work behind the scenes," Kidd said of his time at the Federal Reserve. "We're not on the committees. We don't have name tags. And I've been working with Congress, with both Democrats and Republicans in all sorts of areas to get legislation passed. And so I'm not looking to show up on the first day and ask where my committee seat is."

The leaders of the Republican and Democratic caucuses select committee members. The majority party gets to choose the majority of committee members. Caucus leaders can choose non-partisan members of Congress if they choose.

Currently, no non-partisans serve in the U.S. House of Representatives. Republicans hold a slim majority, 220 to 212. The U.S. House currently has three vacancies with two representatives, both Democrats, dying while in office. One Republican resigning his position.

"Not that I won't work on a committee," Kidd continued. "And I think we've seen from other senators and congresspeople that have been in Congress that have been willing to work across the aisle and sometimes have been independent, that they've gotten committee assignments. Because when the votes are close, you may not be caucusing with one party or the other, but they put you to work.

"So whether I have a particular committee assignment or not, I will continue to work with congressional staff and Congress," Kidd said.

Amodei, who has been Nevada's 2nd U.S. House District representative for 14 years, said Congress doesn't work the way Kidd explains it.

"While it sounds good,  that isn't the way that things work," Amodei countered. "You get committees, you get assignments, you lobby your bill, put your people together, and of course, you work across the aisle. I do that now, work across the aisle right now, whether you like it or not, with Democrats and Republicans.

"And so when you say, well, there's non-partisan as a voter registration thing in Nevada and it is DMV (Department of Motor Vehicles) driven, there's nothing wrong with that," Amodei said. "But to say, I'm going to go back to Congress and be non-affiliated first, I question that because Greg's a smart guy. You've got to hook up with somebody. And so it's like, well, who are you going to hook up with?"

Amodei said members of the U.S. House have just two years to prove themselves. Lack of any political-party affiliation won't help you get re-elected, he added.

"If you're elected, you've got 24 months, OK?" Amodei said. "So that clock is ticking all the time. And so when you know that you're back in 24 months saying, 'Hey, do you want to rehire me for the next 24 months?', what have you done? How have you positioned yourself? Those are all fair questions."

Kidd says he see the issue from a different perspective.

"Believe me, for someone coming from a tech background like I have and have been allowed to buy a federally-chartered bank, in this case in Oklahoma, I know what it takes to get things done within a two-year period," Kidd said. "And I intend to bring that type of attitude -- which is a more business attitude rather than a lawyer attitude -- to my time in Congress. And again, it's not my first trip to the rodeo."

Amodei shot back: "Kind of sounds like Donald Trump for a minute, doesn't it? " In the first day of the debate, Amodei said Kidd was endorsed by the Nevada Democratic Party.

"Sure does," Kidd countered.

When the debate turned to Yucca Mountain and the storage/reprocessing of nuclear waste in Nevada, Amodei remained opposed, a stance that most of Nevada's delegation to Congress has taken for decades.

"First of all, maybe it'll restart the discussion on things other than taking it to a hole in a lowly populated area of any state and just putting it there and hoping that it goes away," he said.

"Also, by the time you get done having a responsible modern discussion, (the conclusion) will be different than when the original legislation passed in the 1980s, that just basically said, take it to Nevada and it won't hurt anybody there."

Both candidates hoped the waste could be reprocessed as a fuel source. Kidd said Congress should decide where the waste should be stored or processed. He stressed the site can't be Yucca Mountain because the science has already proven that is not a viable site.

"I'm not a 'Not In My Backyard' kind of person," Kidd said. "We are going to have to have a debate and Congress is going to have to pick a site.

"We've seen the technical reasons why Yucca Mountain isn't a good site, but we as a country are going to have to step up to the plate," Kidd continued. "We're gonna have to do something with that nuclear waste. And so I do think, once again, this is an area where Congress has really got to step up. And again, this should not be a partisan issue."

Amodei agreed with Kidd that storage and processing nuclear waste should not be a partisan issue. However,that does not end the danger for Nevada.

"When Greg says it shouldn't be a partisan issue, you're absolutely right," Amodei said. "It wasn't a partisan issue when the other 49 states ganged up on us. So, we need to have a different approach in terms of just, "We're going to convince the other 49 states to put themselves at risk as opposed to us,' which is why I think you slant towards reprocessing, ... new technology that doesn't create the same kind of waste. Those sorts of things."

Kidd insisted Congress must choose a site.

"I would say that if you're going to reprocess it, you still got to pick a place. And we're one of 50 states and it's a lottery, not a very nice lottery," Kidd said. "But we do need to have a Congress that's going to basically put, in this case, the interests of the country first."

That's a losing proposition for Nevada, Amodei said.

Congress' action "will be gang up on one state," Amodei said. "That's been the history. And I see nothing in the offing that changes that."

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