Shelley Berkley
Party: Democrat
State: Nevada
What you need to know: In the House, she serves on the powerful Ways and Means Committee.
Democrat - Challenger
Endorsed for U.S. Senate by Council for a Livable World
Congresswoman Shelley Berkley is running in the Nevada Senate contest that has produced more twists and turns in the last six months than most elections in two years.
Berkley is campaigning for the seat held by scandal-plagued Senator John Ensign (R), who had an affair with a former campaign staffer married to a member of his staff. Facing investigations into reported payments to the family, Ensign first said he would run for re-election in 2012, then announced he would not run again and resigned in seat in April the day before an Ethics Committee hearing into his behavior.
The Nevada Senate contest has become one of the Democrats’ top pick-up seats in the country, and Berkley will, no doubt, bring a breath of fresh air to this Senate seat.
Berkley is a seven-term Congresswoman who has lived in Las Vegas for more than four decades. She became the first member of her family to attend college, graduating with honors from the University of Nevada – Las Vegas where she was elected student body president her senior year.
After Ensign resigned, the Nevada Governor appointed U.S. Representative Dean Heller to the seat. Heller is a conservative who has moved further and further to the right over his career. In the last three years, Heller scored zero on Council for a Livable World’s voting record. He has supported the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, voted for more money for new nuclear weapons and to cut funding for the United Nations. He will feel right at home with the tea party conservatives in the Senate.
Berkley, on the other hand is an outspoken advocate for Nevada, for middle class Americans and for arms control who supported the New START nuclear reductions agreement and supports new nuclear reductions with Russia building on that treaty’s success. She endorses the Administration’s goal of securing and retrieving vulnerable nuclear-weapons usable materials worldwide within four years and opposes building a new generation of nuclear weapons. She will vote for a Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, and has taken steps to build support for the treaty in the past.
Berkley is a seven-term Congresswoman who has lived in Las Vegas for more than four decades. She became the first member of her family to attend college, graduating with honors from the University of Nevada – Las Vegas where she was elected student body president her senior year. In 1976, she earned a law degree from the University of San Diego School of Law. She held a variety of corporate legal jobs before being elected to her first term in the House of Representatives in 1998.
In the House, she serves on the powerful Ways and Means Committee and is known as a hard worker who is indefatigable and omnipresent.
She will have to work hard over the next 14 months to win this election. The Nevada Senate contest is clearly a competitive top tier race -- one which is expected to be close until the very end. Public opinion polling shows the candidates neck-and-neck. A June Republican poll had Berkley just ahead of Heller 46%-44%. The two candidates are also very close in fundraising, both having over $2.2 million in their campaign treasuries at the end of June. Berkley will benefit from a Democratic registration advantage in the state
Nevada provides one of the few opportunities for Democrats to take a Republican seat. Rep. Shelley Berkley is a quality candidate and a dedicated individual who will be a solid supporter of arms control and a leader for the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty in the United States Senate.
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Berkley for Senate
Council for a Livable World
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