As in legislative sessions past, The Nevada Independent is publishing a series of profiles featuring the new lawmakers in the state. This is the 11th installment of more than a dozen. Check back in coming days for additional stories on new legislators' backgrounds, interests and policy positions.

STATE SENATOR JEFF STONE

• Freshman Republican from Henderson who succeeds Republican Keith Pickard, a divorce and custody lawyer who was part of the Legislature from 2018 to 2022
• Represents District 20, which encompasses the southern point of Nevada and includes the towns of Moapa, Mesquite and Boulder City. Before redistricting, the geographical area now known as District 20 was largely part of District 12, and represented by Sen. Joe Hardy.
• District 20 is mostly Republican (41 percent Republican, 25 percent Democrat and 34 percent registered as Independents and to other political parties in the 2022 election).
• Defeated Democrat Brent Foutz in the general election, carrying 62 percent of the vote. The Republican primary election was canceled after two-term state assemblyman and Boulder City local Glen Leavitt withdrew from the race.
• Will sit on Commerce and Labor, Health and Human Services and Judiciary committees.

FAMILY AND EDUCATION

Jeff Stone was born in Los Angeles in 1956 before his family moved to the Cinderella Homes outside Disneyland in Anaheim. He attended public school there before becoming the first person in his family to attend college. He studied at the University of California, Irvine, UCLA and eventually USC School of Pharmacy, where he received a doctorate in pharmacy. 

He is a real estate agent based in Henderson, where he lives with his wife of almost 23 years, Regina. Stone has four grown children and several grandchildren. 

CAREER

Stone opened Temecula Pharmacy in 1983 and ran for Temecula City Council in 1992. He won and served on the council — including as mayor — until 2004. By the end of Stone’s time on the council, Temecula’s population had expanded nearly fourfold, with more than 85,000 people residing in the area by 2004. Stone served on the Riverside County Board of Supervisors from 2005 to 2014 and was a California state senator from 2014 to 2019. 

In November 2019, he was appointed by former President Donald Trump to be the regional representative for the San Francisco office of the U.S. Department of Labor.

Stone also sells real estate. He has invested in properties throughout his career, following the advice of his father, who was a real estate broker.

PROFILE

Stone, 66, in many ways grew up along with California. 

Two years after getting his doctorate in pharmacy in 1981, Stone moved to Temecula, then a newly incorporated town in Riverside County. Today, it’s the 10th most populated county in the United States. 

“It was kind of a place where people from San Diego that couldn't afford homes or people from LA, Orange County [moved to]. The dirt for homes was cheaper. They're able to get a home and raise a family,” Stone said. “I wanted to open my first pharmacy in an area where there wasn't a chain store on every corner, so I went to the city of Temecula.”

He was on his way to work at his small business, Temecula Pharmacy, when Stone saw graffiti on the storefront of Bianchi International, a leather company that made gun holsters for mostly public safety agencies, Stone said. Unhappy, Stone stood in line at a town meeting and complained to his local government.

“The mayor said, ‘Don't worry about it, Mr. Stone. We're going to take care of it. Thank you very much. Next in line,’” Stone said. “In [summer] of the same year, they were having the first city council election after incorporation, and the graffiti problem wasn't getting better, it was getting worse. And so I decided, ‘You know what? I'm going to run.’”

Stone won his first election in 1992 and served on the council — either as a councilman or mayor — for the next 12 years. After time on the Riverside County Board of Supervisors, he served as a state senator for California’s 28th District from 2014 to 2019, at a time when Republicans were outnumbered by Democrats about 2 to 1.

“I learned when you're in the minority, if you want to get things done, you’ve got to find common ground with the other side and see where you can agree on things that make our lives better for the people you represent,” Stone said about his time as a California state senator. “So I'm very proud of having many bills with my name on it, including many that have just my name on it, which is kind of rare for a Republican.”

In late 2019, Stone was asked by former President Donald Trump to be the regional representative for the Department of Labor. It was at that time Stone decided to move to One Queensridge Place, a condominium complex in Summerlin, eventually relocating to Henderson.

“It was just fortuitous that we moved there because on Jan. 20 of 2020, I was no longer employed. I was part of the administration. When President Trump was out of a job, I was out of a job for the first time in my adult life,” Stone said. “It was kind of like hitting a block wall.”

Stone bought properties throughout his career, following the advice of his father, who told him, “‘If you take what you make in pharmacy, invest in real estate. Forget about it. Don't ever sell it. If it goes up, goes down, just keep it and keep adding to it. By the time you're my age, you'll live a good life.”

Because of his property investment experience, Stone obtained his real estate license but became bored after selling a few homes.

During that time, Stone and his friend Ryan Erwin — the founder and president of RedRock Strategies, a political consulting firm based in Las Vegas — met regularly to talk about politics.

“One day he said to me, ‘You know Jeff, it is just fortuitous that you moved to Henderson because the senator there's termed-out and I know that you’re a conservative guy and hey, this is a conservative district. I think you gotta run,’” Stone said.

Stone said the hardest part was a conversation he and Erwin had with Stone’s wife Regina  after Stone had told her he was set on retiring from politics. As Erwin talked to Regina about Stone’s political career, she became suspicious.

“She's looking at me like what's going on here? He finally said, ‘What do you think about your husband running for the state Senate?’ And she looked at him and she looked at me, she goes, ‘Ryan, I support my husband with whatever he wants to do.’ Which was really pretty sweet,” Stone said, recalling the evenings apart from his wife when he was at late government meetings or public events.

It was no small feat for a Californian to win a Nevada office — specifically in a rural, conservative district. Well-known Republican former assemblyman and Boulder City local Glen Leavitt had been in the running, but withdrew just days before a candidate filing deadline, eliminating the need for a primary. 

“I tell people that I may not be Battle Born, but I’m battle tested, being a super minority in California. So everybody pretty much embraced me,” Stone said.

He said his experience in California will aid him in being a good legislator for Nevada.

“The experience that I had, I thought, might be an asset to not just the Republican caucus, but I think the entire Legislature,” Stone said. “A lot of the issues that they're seeing here, we've already discussed them in California years ago.”

“I want to be part of a good legislative session that [is] productive and helpful to people, that helps make their lives easier and healthier,” he added.

ON THE ISSUES

Health care

Stone looked back on his time working with Labor Secretary Eugene Scalia when COVID-19 was beginning to hit Arizona.

“We didn't have enough health care professionals to take care of people and Gov. (Doug) Ducey had to figure out a way to get more health professionals there to take care of all these people,” Stone said.

Stone wants to help bolster Nevada’s health care workforce by adopting occupational licensing recognition. This would allow out-of-state health care professionals the ability to practice within Nevada without the process of relicensing. 

Elections

Stone would like to see Nevada pass a voter ID requirement this session. He also wants more controls on the Department of Motor Vehicles’ process of registering people to vote when they receive or renew their driver’s license.

“I'm not against motor voter, if you have proof of your citizenship,” Stone said. “But if you don't have proof of citizenship, you can't tell the registrar of voters this person is OK to vote.”

Stone supports mail-in voting — as long as ballots are postmarked by 5 p.m. Election Day — and has no problem with electronic voting machines. When it comes to elections, Stone said in general he would like to see the government add an extra identification step to show transparency to the electorate.

“We can always do more to let the citizens know that we are safeguarding their vote,” Stone said. 

Taxes

“I have been an anti-tax advocate my entire life, so I've never voted for a tax,” Stone said. 

Instead, Stone wants to bring in new businesses and have them put a portion of their revenue back into the community — a strategy he said he used on the Temecula City Council.

Education

Stone said the two biggest issues facing education today are low salaries for teachers and teacher safety.

Stone is working on bills to increase teacher salaries to make them more competitive with surrounding states and keep teachers in Nevada.

He also “strongly supports” school choice, saying it spurs healthy competition among schools for state dollars.

“If somebody wants to lift their kid up and get them in a better school, they should have that choice to move that child into a better school area,” Stone said.