Las Vegas Sun: Assembly candidate omits party affiliation in campaign materials

The Las Vegas Sun ran a story in Monday's paper profiling Sean Fellows, a Republican running for state assembly against April Mastroluca in District 29.

According to the Sun, Fellows neglects to mention his party affiliation in any of his campaign materials, and he brings it up only when asked during door-to-door campaigning. 

The paper's story says Fellows is hoping to sidestep the issue of partisanship in an attempt to target Democrats and independents who are down on Republicans because of the unpopular policieis of the Bush administration.

According to the Sun, Fellows' strategy is working:

"Fellows is on his second pair of New Balance sneakers.

And he appears to have persuaded plenty of registered Democrats and Republican-leery Republicans to not limit their consideration to party identification alone.

He’s standing now in front of 61-year-old Democrat Hugh Kennedy, who has a “No Solicitors” sign stamped on his front door. They agree that the local public schools spend too much money on middle managers and not enough in the classrooms. Kennedy initially appears skeptical of Fellows, but he engages the Republican for 10 minutes on the subject.

Fellows does not mention to Kennedy that he is a Republican, and Kennedy does not ask.

Down Sedona Road, Democrat Sandra MacNeil pointedly asks Fellows if he’s partisan.

“I’m a Republican, but I serve Nevada first,” he says, clearly pleasing the 56-year-old MacNeil. “Are you a Democrat?”

“It doesn’t matter to me,” she replies. “You coming by, it holds extra water for me.”

Read the complete story here.