LAS VEGAS — President Donald Trump will headline the Nevada Republican Party’s convention on Saturday and also appear at a fundraiser with Republican U.S. Sen. Dean Heller, officials confirmed Monday.
Heller is considered the most vulnerable Republican senator seeking re-election this year because he’s the only one running in a state that Democrat Hillary Clinton won in 2016. Democrats face long odds to take control of the U.S. Senate in the November midterm election, but to do so, they would almost certainly have to flip Heller’s seat.
Heller’s campaign spokesman Keith Schipper said Trump would appear at a fundraiser for the senator Saturday. He will also speak at the convention, which takes place Friday and Saturday at the Suncoast hotel-casino in northwest Las Vegas, the state Republican Party confirmed.
Details about Trump’s speech were not immediately available.
An invitation for the Heller fundraiser obtained by the Las Vegas Review-Journal shows donors will be offered a private photo reception with the president for $15,000 and a private roundtable with Trump for $50,000.
Contributions for the event will raise money for the Nevada Republican Party, the National Republican Senatorial Committee and Heller. Schipper confirmed the invitation posted by the newspaper is accurate.
A time and location for the private event have not yet been released.
“Sen. Heller looks forward to joining President Trump this weekend to talk about how their agenda has put more Nevadans to work, cut taxes on Nevada families, and helped our veterans access the care they have earned,” Schipper said in a statement.
Heller was a critic of Trump when he was running for president and clashed with him over health care last year, but they have since become allies.
The president persuaded the senator’s strongest primary challenger to drop out of the race, and Heller contends his re-election will stop Democrats from being able to impeach Trump.
Heller breezed through the primary last week but faces a tough fight from Democratic Rep. Jacky Rosen, a first-term congresswoman who was recruited to run for office by former Democratic Sen. Harry Reid.
Democrats have an edge among registered voters in the swing state and are hoping a “blue wave” of backlash to the president will help carry them to victory in Nevada and around the country this November.
If elected, Rosen would be a check on the Trump administration, spokeswoman Molly Forgey said in a statement.
Heller “has spent the last year proving his loyalty to President Trump and letting Nevadans down by breaking his promises to protect our health care, passing a tax giveaway to his super-wealthy donors, and rejecting bipartisan solutions to protect our ‘Dreamers,’” Forgey said, referring to young immigrants in the country illegally who were brought to the U.S. as children.
