Lombardo defers to feds on affordability, inflation issues: ‘I can’t control that’

Nevada Gov. Joe Lombardo says there’s nothing he can do about affordability and warns claims to the contrary are “bullshit.” The governor, a Republican, faces a reelection challenge in November from Democratic Attorney General Aaron Ford. Polling has the race tied or Lombardo slightly ahead.

Lombardo’s comments came at a meet and greet with veterans in Las Vegas in early July when an attendee asked the governor about his plan to address Nevada’s high grocery and housing costs. The economy is a key issue for voters. 

“There’s a big difference between the federal space and the local space, right? And when we talk about affordability and inflation rates and everything, I can’t control that,” said Lombardo, who rode to his first term victory largely by pummeling Democratic Gov. Steve Sisolak for the ills of “Bidenflation.”

“Let me be clear: this recession is a direct result of Sisolak and Biden’s disastrous economic leadership,” he tweeted in 2022.

The governor was “simply reiterating what every voter understands: there is a big difference between the decisions made by the federal government versus the state government,” Lombardo’s campaign spokesperson Halee Dobbins said in a statement. She would not say why Lombardo, in 2022, tied Sisolak to the national economy, but is giving himself a pass. 

Lombardo has options to counter the effects of President Donald Trump’s policies, says political consultant Annette Magnus. The first, she says, is to pick up the phone and take advantage, on behalf of Nevadans, of his relationship with Trump, who is scheduled to visit Las Vegas on Wednesday. 

“Lombardo is part of the MAGA agenda,” Magnus notes of the governor’s support for Trump’s initiatives, such as the war in Iran, even as the president’s policies hurt Nevadans. “He has the ear of the president.”

Indeed, Lombardo has reached out to Trump for special favors, such as restoring subsidies to solar plants on federal land, and urging him to back off the imposition of tariffs on lithium. 

Since Trump took office for the second time, the average Nevada family has paid $3,300 more for goods and services, says a new report from the Joint Economic Committee Minority.

Lombardo told the audience he “can do everything I can within the state resources to help an individual in any situation… We’ve done a lot. We’ve expanded upon the economy. We’ve increased school choice. We’ve increased medical services. We’ve increased education. When you talk about kitchen table issues such as affordability, groceries and all that, that is a driver of the federal government, OK?”

Under Lombardo, Dobbins notes, “Nevada has attracted more than $6 billion in private investment, created nearly 100,000 jobs, cut taxes on employers, reduced over 900 burdensome regulations, invested more than $1 billion in attainable housing, and helped Nevada lead the nation in both job and wage growth.” 

But critics assert Lombardo’s housing initiative, a boon for developers, subsidizes 5,000 homes (scaled back from 16,000) for middle-income buyers, and does not address the state’s critical shortage of low-income housing – which Lombardo relies on the federal government to provide. Nevada is short approximately 80,000 low-income units.  

Additionally, Lombardo has twice killed legislation that would have limited the number of homes corporations can purchase – a significant factor in the home flipping that drives up prices for buyers. 

The governor’s agenda, those critics say, has made life tougher for lower-income Nevadans. Lombardo, they contend, is out of touch with regular folk  – evidenced by his behavior during a traffic stop in May, and his assertion to a television reporter last week that he doesn’t “get paid very much.”

Lombardo earned $182,000 in 2023 for wages and benefits as governor. He also collects an annual pension from the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Dept. of just under $200,000, according to Transparent Nevada. 

The average Nevadan earns just under $60,000 a year, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. They work more and earn less than residents of any surrounding state.

“The Governor has dedicated his career to serving others and considers it a privilege to do so,” his spokesman Drew Galang said via email. “While he could have phrased his remarks more clearly, his point was simple: he didn’t choose this work for the salary – he chose it to serve the people of Nevada, and he remains committed to that mission every day.”

But it’s Lombardo’s commitment to business interests, not the little guy, that has allowed him to amass a war chest with $9.2 million on hand and a $12 million haul in the second quarter for the Lombardo-affiliated Better Nevada political action committee.

That haul will allow Lombardo to “use his cash advantage to define Ford in as unflattering terms as possible to try to make the election a choice instead of a referendum on the GOP,” says UNLV Political Science Prof. David Damore. The former sheriff’s ads, Damore says, indicate “criminal justice will be the cudgel.” 

Lombardo, Magnus says, could have illustrated his commitment to Nevandans by refraining from toppling numerous bills intended to make their lives easier. Instead, she says, “he bragged about vetoing a record-breaking 87 bills last session.”  The record he broke was his own from the previous legislative session. 

Among Lombardo’s vetoes:   

• a measure that would have expanded paid family and medical leave for government workers, and mandated that private employers with at least 50 employees provide leave;
• legislation that would have provided free school meals following the expiration of pandemic funding;
• a bill that would have strengthened tenant protections by including safety and health standards in the definition of habitable housing;
• another tenant protection measure that required landlords to spell out all fees, and prohibited assessing application fees on minors. The bill would have temporarily capped rent for seniors and Social Security recipients through December of this year; and
• a bill that would have prohibited the sale of prescription drugs for more than the Medicare-established price.

“Many of those bills had cost-saving components,” Magnus adds. A bill she championed would have allowed residents of homeowners associations, who are currently prohibited from providing day care, to provide care for five to 12 children. 

The average annual cost of childcare in Nevada is between $9,000 and $10,000, with some options costing significantly more. 

Structural barriers

Governors across the United States are “taking action on affordability solutions encompassing everything from food and housing to energy and targeted tax relief that puts more money back into household budgets,” says the National Governor’s Association website. 

Governors, experts say, can be most effective in addressing tax policies, housing supply initiatives, and utility regulations. 

The state of Washington, which, like Nevada has no income tax, gave taxpayers a tax credit to help them get by. 

“It’s essentially a spending program that working families can apply for and receive assistance to make sure that they can afford their childcare and keep going to work and not fall back below poverty or fall into poverty,” explains Dylan Grundman O’Neill of the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy (ITEP).

“Any politician who stands before you and says, ‘Well, I’m going to fix inflation.’ That’s bullshit,” Lombardo said at the meet and greet in Las Vegas. “And the reason why I say bullshit, you have limited resources that goes along with it.”

Nevada indeed has limited resources, and Lombardo has vowed not to bolster them via tweaks to tax policy. Instead, he said at the meet and greet, he’ll “continue to look for inefficiencies and fraud and everything else in government, which I’ve done for the last four years, and reallocate those available funds for individuals that need that resource.” 

“We all want to believe that our leaders and representatives are doing what they can to help, and when it comes to the state government’s role in Nevada, there are some real structural barriers to addressing affordability,” says Grundman O’Neill of ITEP. “There’s also sometimes a degree of resignation or even defeatism about what state leaders can do.”

According to ITEP, Nevada households with the lowest incomes pay an overall state and local tax rate of almost 12%, while the wealthiest households are paying less than 3%.

“That’s one of the one of the five most regressive tax codes in the country, and a direct result of policy choices made by governors, lawmakers, and state voters,” says Grundman O’Neill. Leaders, he says, can overcome barriers by not being one, and instead “championing policies that result in real change.” 

Trump’s policies have only exacerbated the disparity between low-income and wealthy Nevadans. The Big Beautiful Bill amounted to a $100,000 tax cut on average for the wealthiest Nevada households, ITEP estimates, and less than a $100 benefit for their low-income counterparts. 

“Nevada lawmakers and the governor could improve the lives of people in their state by tapping into that $100,000 surplus and investing in affordable housing, childcare, public education, higher education, and stronger healthcare programs,” says Grundman O’Neill. “By balancing out your tax code you give low- and middle-income people a  break, but you also end up with more money to fund other ways of helping them.”

Magnus, meanwhile, is not holding her breath for Lombardo to come around. “He knows there’s a problem with affordability. He’s had two (legislative) sessions to do something about it.”