Rep. Jacky Rosen (D-Nev.) late Tuesday secured her party’s nomination to oppose Sen. Dean Heller (R-Nev.) for a U.S. Senate seat in November’s general election.
Rosen, who was endorsed by the Democratic National Committee shortly after declaring she would run to take Heller’s seat, defeated four opponents in Nevada’s closed Demcoratic primary.
Rosen collected 77 percent of the vote in her race, while Heller gathered about 70 percent of Republican votes to knock off four primary challengers of his own.
Heller, an uncompromising opponent of the proposed Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository in Nye County, Nev., is considered one of the more vulnerable Senate incumbents in this year’s midterm elections. He is the only incumbent in 2018 to defend a Senate seat in a state Hillary Clinton won in the 2016 presidential election.
Both candidates are in their first terms in their current elected positions. Rosen, 60, won her House seat in 2016. Heller, 58, narrowly won his Senate seat in 2012 after being elected to the House in 2006 and a brief appointment to the upper chamber to replace John Ensign.
Heller has parlayed his rigid opposition to Yucca into a campaign cornerstone, claiming Rosen is soft on the issue, and that only he can prevent Congress from running roughshod over Nevada and developing the mountain into a permanent repository for defense and civilian nuclear waste.
“[W]hen it comes to protecting our economy and keeping Nevadans safe, I’ve repeatedly stopped Yucca Mountain while Congresswoman Rosen has proven herself ineffective and asleep on the job,” Heller said in a prepared statement after the primary.
Heller opposes developing Yucca Mountain for any purpose and claims he has single-handedly prevented the Senate from funding the Department of Energy’s license application with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. The Donald Trump administration has proposed restarting that application, which was defunded by the Barack Obama administration.
Rosen opposes turning Yucca Mountain into a waste repository, but does not necessarily oppose developing the facility for other purposes. Earlier this year, in a proposed amendment to the 2018 Nuclear Waste Policy Amendments Act, Rosen said Yucca could be used as a control center for remotely controlled Pentagon aircraft or as a research and development center for renewable energy, among other things.
Meanwhile, right-winger Danny Tarkanian, who once sought to wrest the GOP nomination from Heller, will face Democrat Susie Lee in the race for the 3rd Congressional District seat Rosen is vacating in the House. Both mopped up a crowded field of primary opponents.
U.S. midterm elections are scheduled for Nov. 6.
