(Rosen image from campaign ad; Brown photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images)
Nevada Democratic U.S. Sen. Jacky Rosen and Republican challenger Sam Brown were literally tied after initial election results were released Tuesday night, and by that time the race in Nevada was already irrelevant to control of the Senate, which Republicans had wrested from Democrats earlier in the evening.
With an estimated 74% of votes counted, Rosen led Brown by a mere 180 votes out of more than 960,000, and the two both had 47.8% of the vote.
Brown, a West Point graduate and Army captain who was badly burned by an improvised explosive device (IED) in Afghanistan, had been shown trailing Rosen by as much as 10 points in some polling leading up to the election, though in the the last days of the campaign he expressed confidence the the gap was narrowing.
Rosen, who raised $46.5 million through the third quarter, pummeled Brown in television ads over his inconsistent record on reproductive freedom. Before moving to Nevada in 2018, Brown managed the Texas congressional campaign of a candidate who opposed abortion without exceptions for rape, incest, and health of the mother. As a legislative candidate in that state, Brown said he’d support a ban on abortion with no exceptions after 20 weeks. Â
Brown raised $20 million through the third quarter. He also received a last-minute boost of $6 million in late October from the Senate Leadership Fund, a Republican super PAC, NBC reported.
Rosen, billing herself as the most bipartisan member of Congress, led Brown in polling throughout the race. The former president of a synagogue in Henderson, Rosen served one term in the House of Representatives before her election to the Senate in 2018.Â
The race is Brown’s second for the U.S. Senate. In 2022, he lost the Republican primary to former Attorney General Adam Laxalt, who was defeated by the incumbent, Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto.Â
Brown, who was endorsed by former Pres. Donald Trump, declined to register support for Trump’s plan to deport millions of undocumented immigrants and voiced support for a more simple path to citizenship. His campaign focused on the economy, cutting the federal budget, and easing prices for Nevadans.
The Nevada race was one of a handful of competitive contests nationwide expected to determine which party would control the Senate. But the Senate map strongly favored Republicans thrroughout the cycle, with Democratic incumbents defending seats in several Trump states, including a seat in West Virginia which was being relinquished by Democrat Joe Manchin and was won Tuesday by Republican Gov. Jim Justice. The Democratic loss of that seat was a foregone conclusion.
Also Tuesday, Ohio Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown was defeated by Republican Bernie Moreno, securing Republicans at the least a tie in the Senate while they awaited the results in Montana, where incumbent Democratic Sen. Jon Tester was trailing Republican challenger Tim Sheehy. Democratic incumbents were also facing stiff challenges in Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.
When Nebraska incumbent Republican Sen. Deb Fischler was declared the winner over independent candidate Dan Osborne, that sealed Republican control of the Senate.