RENO, Nev. (AP) – The bitter primary saw nearly a dozen Republican Senate candidates take out the retired Army captain. Sam Brown is disappearing from view for some, who say their quest to take down incumbent Democratic Sen. Jacky Rosen trumps any intraparty grievances from a bitter Republican primary.
Not number two Jeff Gunter.
“The America First faithful had no interest in campaigning with him during the entire primary season, during which he relied on establishment influence and money to secure a nomination,” Gunter said Wednesday after his distant second-place finish .
The dermatologist and former Trump-appointed Icelandic ambassador continued to attack Brown as an establishment candidate in a lengthy statement in which he roundly predicted Rosen would win another term in November.
Gunter’s criticism could complicate the Republican Party’s early efforts to unite around Brown. And it comes as the Republican Party looks to overcome intraparty divisions in the primaries to focus on what will be one of the most closely watched Senate races of the year.
Gunter said former President Donald Trump’s late endorsement of Brown, who appeared in a social media post hours after he showed up in Nevada for the primaries, would not be enough to convince loyal Republicans to support the nominee, who avoided debates and did not interfere in the elections. other 11 candidates in the race.
“The base is smart and they don’t forget it and I think he has a lot to prove before he earns their support,” Gunter said.
One of Gunter’s most high-profile supporters, Nevada GOP national committee member Sigal Chattah, struck a different tone. She said Wednesday that a historical precedent of Nevada Republicans dissing Republican nominees they don’t like “died last night.”
“Any attempt to marginalize the chosen candidate will be met with fierce criticism from the party,” Chattah said.
For months, Brown faced criticism from his own party, which chastised him for skipping debates, reversed his position on the status of the mothballed nuclear waste repository at Yucca Mountain, and called him the hand-picked establishment candidate of national Republicans like the Senate Minority Leader. Mitch McConnell. Brown’s absence became more of an issue than any policy during the primary debates, with candidates explicitly urging voters not to cast their votes for Brown.
Some of those criticisms echoed Brown’s own messages from two years ago, when he ran in the Republican primary against Nevada Attorney General Adam Laxalt, drawing dozens of high-profile endorsements. Laxalt defeated Brown in the primaries, but then lost to Democratic U.S. Senator Catherine Cortez Masto by 8,000 votes, giving Democrats the Senate majority.
Chattah had previously criticized Brown for a “lack of integrity” and pointed to a CNN report that Brown had created a political action committee to help other Republicans, then diverted the money to pay off his failed 2022 campaign. She said in an interview that her mission now is to defeat Rosen, and discouraged other Republicans from attacking Brown in the future.
“I don’t do returns. So that was my feeling,” she said when asked about the report. “Regardless of my sentiment, I am the committeewoman of the RNC, and I am a Republican. And I will unequivocally support the Republican candidate.”
Brown did not acknowledge his opponents in his victory speech on Tuesday and instead turned his attention to Rosen and President Joe Biden.
Brown’s campaign did so again in a statement Wednesday when asked about Gunter’s comments.
“Nevada voters are clearly united behind our grassroots campaign to end the Biden-Rosen American Nightmare. And that’s what we’re 100% focused on,” said Communications Director Kristy Wilkinson.
Trump’s endorsement of Brown two days before the primaries was a blow to many opponents who wanted to align themselves with the former president, but none more so than Gunter, who had billed himself as “110% pro-Trump.”
In a Monday post on
Trump campaign adviser Chris LaCivita addressed Gunter directly in his response, saying: “You have a habit of making up nonsense. President Trump makes his own decisions and this is another example of him choosing wisely.”
Among Brown’s detractors and detractors was former lieutenant governor candidate and Air Force veteran Tony Grady, who had campaigned for Brown during his insurgent 2022 campaign before running against him this cycle. More recently, Grady had called Brown a “fake politician.”
Grady said he saw Brown as more “among the people” in 2022 than in his 2024 campaign, and that skipping debates did not necessarily mean “putting his best foot forward.”
“But the reality is that he had a plan to run his campaign and it was successful,” said Grady, who immediately endorsed Brown after his loss and said Brown should get the votes of his supporters. “At this point it doesn’t really matter what my thoughts are about skipping debates. He was successful in winning the primaries.”
