Assemblymember Joe Dalia: 

• Dalia replaces five-term Democratic Assm. Lesley Cohen, who retired to focus on her private life. 
• Dalia won Assembly District 29, a slightly Democratic-leaning district that cuts across large swaths of Henderson, with some 33 percent of voters registered as Democrats, 32.5 percent registered as nonpartisan and 26 percent as Republican. 
• Dalia beat Republican challenger Annette Dawson Owens in the general election, securing 52 percent of the vote. 
• He will sit on the education, judiciary and health and human services committees. 

Profile 

Joe Dalia has long had an interest in public service, interning for powerhouse Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV) and working on various campaigns, but it was having children that finally pushed him to run for public office. 

“It gets a lot harder to trust that everything's going to be OK, and you get motivated to do what you can and bring the skills you have to the community,” reflected Dalia, 33. 

Dalia has lived in places throughout the country, from Florida to Michigan, after graduating from Henderson’s Coronado High School. He was the first member of his family to attend a four-year college, and after attending Boston University, he graduated from Michigan Law School. He now works as an attorney for Meta on top of his role as a legislator. 

He said that returning to the Silver State was always on his mind. Now, he is raising his children in the same area that he grew up in. Dalia’s oldest child attends the same elementary school that he did and his younger twins are set to enroll there soon.

Despite its challenges, Dalia says that the Clark County School District shows “glimmers of success.” Seeing his children attend school has hammered home just how important it is to make Nevada a “competitive landing spot” for educators and professionals, he said. 

“Everything, at the end of the day, comes down to how good of a job we do recruiting and retaining the best talent to get our kids where they need to be,” said Dalia. 

On the Issues 

Education

Dalia says that he is a “yes” on providing free school lunches to all K-12 students in Nevada. Republican Gov. Joe Lombardo vetoed a bill last session that would have done that. 

“There are kids in a position where, on paper, they wouldn't need the help, but the reality is their financial situation, maybe their parents have long-term debt,” Dalia said. 

In line with many other state Democrats, Dalia expressed hesitancy around Opportunity Scholarships, which subsidize the cost of attending private schools for eligible low- and middle-income students. Although Dalia believes that students currently in the program should be able to continue in it over the next biennium, he said enrolling their siblings is a “thornier” issue. 

Health care 

Dalia said he believes that part of lowering Nevada’s uninsured rate (10.7 percent of the population is uninsured) will ultimately be up to what the federal government does with the Affordable Care Act, an Obama-era program that expanded health insurance coverage, and which President Donald Trump has previously proposed replacing. 

Dalia said that he also thinks it's important to better advertise state health plans to tackle the state’s uninsured rate. 

Dalia said he hopes to bring back a bill that would have legalized medical aid in dying in the state, but which Lombardo vetoed. Dalia said that the bill has personal implications for him, having seen his father and grandmother struggle in hospice care. 

“When you're at the very end, the idea that the government is super involved in that process, it kind of doesn't sit right,” Dalia said. 

Gun reform 

Dalia said that he is “open” to raising the legal age to purchase semiautomatic weapons to 21, but said he is “cognizant” of “constitutional limitations.” Dalia also said he is all for “responsible gun ownership,” such as the use of gun safes and incentivizing the use of gun owners insurance. 

Elections 

Dalia said he would be open to increasing staff capacity to speed up ballot counting in Nevada.