LAS VEGAS -- There are just three months until Nevadans hit the polls and vote in the Republican presidential caucus, and most of the candidates will be in town this week asking for your vote.
CNN and the Western Republican Leadership Conference are hosting a debate Tuesday evening, and the audience will play a big role. They are going to be able to ask the candidates questions.
Front-runner Mitt Romney says he can create more jobs for Americans by cutting taxes. Herman Cain agrees, claiming his 9-9-9 plan will lower taxes for everyone.
Democrats and progressives answered the Republicans with a Las Vegas event of their own. The World Market Center hosted Project New West, a convention for western state political leaders to get Washington to pay attention to Nevada and its neighbors.
The convention for political leaders sets the Democrat's strategy for the next two years in Nevada and neighboring states. With growing voting power, Nevada and the other mountain west states are being called the new American heartland.
"Westerners have issues that we felt that Washington was ignoring. We saw both parties mine the west for money, so presidential candidates would fly to places like Santa Fe, fly to places like Aspen, but we knew they needed to mine the west for voters," said Jill Hanauer with Project New West.
The Project New West event has become a place for Democratic volunteers and campaigns to organize their outreach methods. This year's main topic is the declining voting power of rural areas and the rise of the urban Hispanic voter.
Local Hispanic politicians say Hispanics are not a single-issue voting bloc and should not be taken for granted by either party.
"If they want the Latino vote, they have to work for it. They have to address their issues," said Nevada Democratic State Senator Ruben Kihuen. "At the end of the day, their issues are the same as everybody else's. They care about jobs, they care about the economy, they care about health care, they care about keeping their homes."
Democratic activists say the Republican Party's stance against the Dream Act and most immigration reform bills alienate Hispanic voters. Project New West says that 80 percent of fourth generation Hispanics still identify themselves as Latinos. That led political organizers at the conference to say that campaign advertising targeted for Hispanics should also play heavily on English language outlets.
