Nevada governor's woes may test public's patience

[April 20, 2009]  LAS VEGAS (AP) -- Things were already bad for Nevada Gov. Jim Gibbons. His approval ratings were down, he was tagged as one of the nation's most vulnerable governors, and fellow Republicans were lining up to challenge him in a primary more than a year away.

Then his divorce filing compared the popular first lady to an "enraged ferret."

Such unbecoming tidbits in recently unsealed divorce papers opened yet another wound for Nevada's badly battered first-term governor. Since being elected in 2006, Gibbons has been accused of sexual assault, sending love notes on a state phone, improperly firing a state employee and now, in court documents filed by his wife, Dawn Gibbons, a history of infidelity.

He also was investigated by the Justice Department, which cleared him of corruption charges. An ethics commission probed his real estate dealings, though it, too, found no evidence of wrongdoing.

While some of the allegations have been dropped and others are still pending in court, all have played out before the voting public in quick succession. It's a cascade of trouble that has left political observers stunned and many voters turned off. Though he won 48 percent of the vote in 2006, the governor's approval rating has dipped to around 25 percent.

And yet, he plans to run again.

"I faced people with real bullets shooting at me," the 64-year-old former fighter pilot and five-term congressman recently answered to critics.

In running for re-election, observers say Gibbons will test conventional political wisdom in a famously unconventional state. In a state with no income tax and no ban on prostitution, many Libertarian-leaning voters have dismissed public officials' personal foibles as, well, personal.

Gibbons is set to find out if times have changed.

"There is a certain culture of Nevadans who feel really quite the opposite of how most other states feel," said Fred Lokken, a political science professor at Truckee-Meadows Community College. "Where I grew up in Wisconsin, if your neighbor had a trashy-looking house, it was your business. Around here it's, 'Yeah, well, they have a right to be that way.' There is a value system in Nevada that would say these are private issues and really don't matter."

But that doesn't silence headlines like the ones Gibbons faced earlier this month, when a Reno judge unsealed most of the Gibbonses' court papers in what has become a very nasty -- and public -- divorce. The couple were married in 1986.

The first lady accused the governor of carrying on two affairs -- one with a Reno doctor's wife and another with a former Playboy model.

As evidence, the filing noted that Gibbons sent more than 860 text messages to the doctor's wife, some into the middle of the night, over a period of several weeks. When the texts on the state-issued phone were first revealed by the Reno Gazette-Journal, Gibbons said he was seeking advice on policy issues and reimbursed the state for the cost.

In divorce papers, Dawn Gibbons' attorney called the explanation "laughable."

The governor and the woman have denied having an affair.

For his part, Gibbons countered that he wanted his wife out of the governor's mansion because she was aggressive.

"It was once said in another context that being in close quarters with such a volatile person was like being locked in a phone booth with an enraged ferret," the court documents said.

The governor is locked in two other legal tangles. One lawsuit filed by a state employee alleges that she was improperly fired because Gibbons thinks she leaked word of his text messaging.

The other stems from a criminal probe in 2006 when then-Congressman Gibbons was accused of sexually assaulting a Las Vegas cocktail waitress. The district attorney found there was not enough evidence to press charges, but the woman has filed a civil lawsuit.

Gibbons denies both allegations, but the civil suits like the divorce proceedings seem destined to linger into the campaign season.

The pileup has Republicans speaking bluntly about the governor's chances.

At least two Republicans plan to challenge the governor for their party's nomination, North Las Vegas Mayor Mike Montandon and former state Sen. Joe Heck.

"You know, I don't necessarily disagree with Jim Gibbons. I was a big supporter of his," Montandon said. "But Jim is making himself less and less electable and there's got to be somebody who is electable."

Holding on to the state's highest office will undoubtedly be a challenge for Republicans. Nevada bucked its roots in November by handing Democrat Barack Obama a 12-point victory over Westerner John McCain. Democrats far outnumber Republicans on voter rolls and control both houses in the Legislature.

[Associated Press; By KATHLEEN HENNESSEY]

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