LAS VEGAS—Sitting outside an Einstein Bros. Bagels in a Las Vegas strip mall, Marty O’Donnell conjured up an image from “The Lord of the Rings.”
“If you want to sum up my political ideology, [J.R.R.] Tolkien does it the best: The Ring of Power needs to be thrown into Mount Doom,” he told The Epoch Times.
Mr. O’Donnell stands out among the seekers of Nevada’s Third District Republican nomination. For one thing, he isn’t a longtime politician; he’s a video game composer, most famous for his work on the “Halo” franchise. Storytelling, not politicking, is his specialty.
His competition in the June 11 primary includes Dan Schwartz, Nevada’s former state treasurer; Drew Johnson, a free-market think tank founder; foreign service veteran Steve Schiffman; and poker player Brian Nadell.
All want to replace Rep. Susie Lee (D-Nev.) in a district that the nonpartisan Cook Political Report rates as “leans Democrat.”
So far, Ms. Lee is way out ahead in fundraising, with more than $3.1 million in receipts as of March 31, according to data from the Federal Election Commission. But many Republican hopefuls are plowing their own considerable wealth into their campaigns.
“They have the money—that’s the issue,” Mr. Schiffman, a self-described moderate who has previously run for office as a moderate Democrat, said in an interview with The Epoch Times.
Mr. Schwartz, a Wall Street veteran now with the angel investment group Band of Angels, gave his campaign $800,000 over the period ending March 31. Mr. O’Donnell donated $500,000 to his campaign during that same window.
Does the composer worry the businessman will leave him in the dust?
Mr. O’Donnell paused before answering.
“I’m a gamer, so I intend to win. And I’m not going to lose because somebody thinks they can spend more money than me, because they can’t,” he said.
The baby boomer said he came to conservative politics early, recalling the 1968 televised debate between National Review founder William F. Buckley Jr. and liberal intellectual Gore Vidal. At the same time, he “still wanted to be a rock star.”
“I sort of split my interests when I was 9 years old,” he said. “I was like, Ronald Reagan on one hand, and Paul McCartney on the other hand.”
He said he believes that conservatives need to do a better job of reaching people through art and entertainment. Arguments alone aren’t enough.
“Those of us who believe certain things have to know that there’s more than one way to express those truths to people,” he said.
Mr. O‘Donnell said he’d bring cognitive diversity to a chamber dominated by lawyers.
“You don’t want 10 engineers making the game. You want an engineer, an artist, an animator, a composer, a writer, a designer—you want people who just approach the world differently. You don’t want all designers. You don’t want all composers. They would be horrible,” he said.
He paused again: “Most of the time, you only want one composer.”
Now retired from the video game world, Mr. O’Donnell said he is confident he can handle Congress’s workload. He pledged to read every bill he signs and to track those bills’ long-range results.
“What I see happening in Congress is like a walk in the park compared to making ‘Halo 2,’” he said.
Mr. O’Donnell’s GOP rivals have questioned his connections to consultants used by Nevada Gov. Joe Lombardo during his 2022 run for that office. Mr. Lombardo endorsed Mr. O’Donnell after the governor’s previous endorsee, Assemblywoman Heidi Kasama, a Republican representing Las Vegas, dropped out in early January.
Filings show that both campaigns paid the public relations firm November Inc. and the elections firm Majority Strategies. Mr. O’Donnell described a meeting with the governor when he was mulling the Third District run as a key step in his entry into the race.
Think Tank Founder Promises Substance Over Sound Bites
On May 7, Drew Johnson made his pitch to a small but engaged crowd at Gilligan’s, a 24-hour establishment in Laughlin, Nevada.“I went to grad school to work at conservative think tanks,” he said.
Like others in the race, Mr. Johnson came to Nevada from somewhere else. His story began in Appalachia, where he was raised by a single mother.
“It was one of the poorest areas in America. And things never got better, even though they spent money in the region. That really made me skeptical of government,” he told The Epoch Times.
Mr. Johnson went on to Belmont University and Pepperdine University, earning a master’s in public policy from the latter.
“I started Tennessee’s free-market think tank when I was living in my car,” he said, referring to the Beacon Center of Tennessee.
Mr. Johnson has been endorsed by the likes of Rep. Ralph Norman (R-S.C.) and Nevada’s lieutenant governor, Stavros Anthony.
“I’ve actually been on the ground writing public policy for conservative lawmakers and getting our ideas passed, rather than just talking about them,” Mr. Johnson said.
After Mr. Johnson spoke at Gilligan’s, one attendee, Phil Foster, said the candidate’s think tank background doesn’t necessarily lend him credibility.
“I have looked at some of these supposed think tanks, and there’s an awful lot of wealthy people determining where that policy goes,” he said.
Mr. Johnson said, “There are think tanks on both sides who sort of sell out because they want a report that they can then take to an agency or to a member of Congress and say, ‘Look at what this says.’”
He told The Epoch Times his policy as a think tank founder was not to change what he was researching based on donations.
Mr. Johnson described Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.), one of the strongest libertarians in Congress, as a “personal hero.”
But he said he wasn’t sure where he would have stood in the confrontation between House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) and both Mr. Massie and Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.) over her motion to remove Mr. Johnson from power.
“It’s tough to say not knowing what went on behind closed doors,” Mr. Johnson said.
“I think we’re doing ourselves a lot of damage by undercutting the Republican Party and making ourselves look a little bit silly and disunified, especially before the election.”
‘I Think I Can Beat Susie Lee’: Former Treasurer
Like Mr. Johnson, who narrowly lost a 2022 county commission race, Mr. Schwartz’s win-loss record isn’t uniformly encouraging. Most notably, the former state treasurer came in second in the 2020 Republican primary for the Third District.Yet polling shared with The Epoch Times shows Mr. Schwartz at or near the top of the heap in the primary field. If there’s any candidate to beat, he seems to be the one. In their conversations with The Epoch Times, his rivals trained much of their fire on him.
The Epoch Times spoke with Mr. Schwartz on May 7 at the Ahern Hotel and Convention Center, where he was attending the Nevada Republican Club Forum.
Mr. Schwartz defended his record as treasurer, highlighting his opposition to the failed Faraday Future electric car plant. He outlined his two top priorities, both common among Republican office seekers: “One is secure the border. Two is, I think term limits are very important.”
More distinctive on the right is his belief that the U.S. Supreme Court should have term limits too. He argued that the body, which is dominated by Republican-nominated justices, has become too politicized.
In particular, Mr. Schwartz questioned the Dobbs decision that overturned Roe v. Wade, telling The Epoch Times that it was “correctly decided” but ignored precedent.
Another signature issue is his support for national service. His campaign website states he “believes we should encourage young people to commit to public service and provide new incentives for everyone who chooses to serve in a military or non-military position.”
Mr. Johnson, the think tank veteran, claimed that Mr. Schwartz supports mandatory national service. Mr. Schwartz’s campaign strongly denied that in messages to The Epoch Times.
Mr. Johnson has campaigned particularly aggressively against Mr. Schwartz, drawing attention to his opponent’s support as treasurer for a corporate income tax.
When asked about that past stance, Mr. Schwartz claimed that Mr. Johnson was using the same “playbook” as Daniel “Big Dan” Rodimer, the former professional wrestler who defeated Mr. Schwartz in the 2020 primary before losing to Ms. Lee. Mr. Rodimer was arrested that same day in connection with a murder in Las Vegas.
At its core, Mr. Schwartz’s pitch has a pragmatic flavor.
“I think I can beat Susie Lee,” he said.
In practice, that means striking a moderate tone without sounding too moderate to the Republican primary electorate.
“It’s not that I’m not conservative. But on the other hand, I’m willing to talk to other people,” he said.
Former Nevada state Sen. and primary candidate Elizabeth Helgelien, who has received endorsements from Gen. Mike Flynn and other MAGA favorites, declined to speak with The Epoch Times, citing the need to focus on “voter contact.”
