Dean Heller knows he’s the most vulnerable Republican senator in the country. But he thinks Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy might just help him hang on to his seat.

“Kennedy is going to retire around sometime early summer,” Heller predicted in Las Vegas last week, according to audio of an event he spoke at that was obtained by POLITICO. “Which I’m hoping will get our base a little motivated because right now they’re not very motivated. But I think a new Supreme Court justice will get them motivated.”


The 45-minute recording of the media-shy Heller shows a senator defending President Donald Trump repeatedly, breaking only delicately with the president on issues like trade and gun control. It’s in line with the tightrope Heller has to walk to have any hope of winning reelection against a Trump-inspired Republican primary opponent and a highly touted Democratic general election challenger — in a state that Hillary Clinton won in 2016.

Heller can't afford to lose conservatives by breaking with Trump, yet must keep a lane to the center open to win a general election. It’s the trickiest political equation facing any GOP senator on the ballot this year.

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“I’m not going to sit here and criticize him,” Heller said when asked about Trump’s flirtation with Democrats on gun control. “Because everything else he’s touched, like this economy, has been just incredible. So, I don’t want to get too far in front of some of these policies.”

Many Republicans credit the Supreme Court vacancy in 2016 with keeping the Senate in GOP control — and making Trump president. Heller went on to float Sen. Mike Lee for the job, calling the Utah Republican the type of conservative who could energize Nevada's electorate in the June 12 primary. Lee's office declined to comment.

“Mike Lee from Utah is probably on that short list of the next Supreme Court justice in our courts,” Heller said during the Q-and-A session with the J. Reuben Clark Law Society in Las Vegas Friday.

But Trump was clearly most on Heller's mind. He dinged the president’s “crazy” tweets about North Korea, before quickly crediting him with fostering better relations with its neighbor to the south. “North Korea joined South Korea and goes to the Olympics. And they say, the only reason they did that was because of President Trump,” Heller said.

The Nevadan once declared that he was “100 percent against Clinton, 99 percent against Trump” and opposed early drafts of the GOP’s plan to repeal Obamacare, much to Trump’s annoyance. But now it’s hard to get Heller to say a cross word about the president, whom Heller seems to view as an asset rather than an anchor.

Trump’s comment last week that he would “take the guns first, go through due process second” turned Heller into the president’s explainer-in-chief.

“I think he misspoke, I can’t imagine that this president believes that. I think today, he does not,” Heller said. “Negotiator as he is, he says, 'I’m going to take a big bite, just so that I can negotiate it back.' I think he’s doing the same thing on trade. I don’t agree with tariffs, but I’m not going to criticize at this point until I see an end result.”

The senator declined to comment on his remarks.

Heller’s efforts to yoke himself to Trump could backfire in Nevada, a state where Democrats are betting on a key Senate pickup by knocking off Heller in November. In an interview, Sen. Catherine Cortez-Masto (D-Nev.) said that Trump is as much a drag on Republicans now as he was in 2016 when she defeated former Rep. Joe Heck (R-Nev.).

“I don’t think it’s changed … he not only could be, I think he is a drag,” Cortez-Masto said. And Heller “is going to have make that calculation for himself. But I know from what I’ve seen, he’s embraced President Trump.”

There may be no other way. Heck famously unendorsed Trump, then promptly lost to Cortez-Masto. Heller is leaning into the triangulation that made him the only incumbent GOP senator in a tough race to win reelection in 2012.

So when Heller was asked at the event about the special counsel investigation dogging Trump, he asserts that the probe should not be killed — before adding that Attorney General Jeff Sessions should appoint a second special counsel to investigate Democrats' efforts to compile damaging information on Trump.

“What I want is [the] Mueller investigation to continue. I don’t want this thing coming to an end,” Heller said. “I would have had the attorney general obviously do an investigation on the other side. They should be doing one simultaneously on both sides. … I’ve talked to the attorney general directly about it, but he’s chosen not to do so.”

He went on to fret about potential Russian interference in the 2018 elections, which includes his own race against Danny Tarkanian in the primary and, if Heller wins, Rep. Jacky Rosen (D-Nev.) in the general election.

“This is the most difficult race in America. This is the No. 1 race in America,” Heller said, adding later: “ They did manipulate our elections. My biggest concern is — I’m going into ’18 and my biggest fear is [the Russians are] going to try to do it again.”

Republicans say Heller is doing the best he can, given the tough hand he’s been dealt running for reelection in the only competitive 2018 battleground that supported Clinton.

“After we passed tax reform we’ve seen him do well in terms of the data that I’m seeing,” said Sen. Thom Tillis (R-N.C.), the vice chairman of the National Republican Senatorial Committee. And, he added: “The president is very supportive of his [reelection].”

Heller aligned himself with Trump's criticism of the Senate’s glacial pace and arcane rules, which have slowed the pace of confirmations and contributed to the failure to repeal Obamacare. Though some credit Heller’s early criticisms of the GOP’s plans to repeal Obamacare with significantly dampening the prospects of health care reform, Heller, in the recording, name-checked Republican Sens. John McCain of Arizona, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska and Susan Collins for voting down the so-called skinny repeal.

Articulating a major complaint of the GOP base, Heller said he wants to change Senate rules to allow much speedier confirmation of judges, something Republicans are discussing privately but which needs bipartisan support. Heller also complained about the 60-vote threshold stymieing his party’s progress on the budget, placing himself at odds with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), who is often attacked by insurgent GOP candidates.

“Our biggest difficulty is that Mitch McConnell likes the rules the way they are,” Heller said. “This 60-vote threshold that we have in the United States Senate, I’m tired of it.”

The 60-vote threshold blocked several immigration proposals last month. Heller voted for the president’s plan, which failed to crack 40 votes. Heller supported comprehensive immigration reform in 2013, but said in Las Vegas last week that the two parties no longer see eye to eye.

The senator sounds resigned to inaction on immigration reform in his remarks, a difficult admission in a state that is more than a quarter Hispanic.

“Republicans want illegal immigrants to work but not vote. Democrats want them not to work, but to vote. Think about that for a minute,” Heller said. “That’s why we can’t come together on a solution for this.”

