Mark Amodei, R-Nev., speaks to a demonstrator in the audience before the House Appropriations Homeland Security Subcommittee hearing in April 2026.Tom Williams/ZUMA
Republican Rep. Mark Amodei says he’s voted Republican in every election since he was 18. Until now.
Amodei, who is retiring next month, represents Nevada’s second congressional district. David Flippo is the Trump-backed Republican nominee to replace him.
But with questions swirling about Flippo’s campaign finances and allegations that Flippo and his campaign misrepresented his military record, Amodei says he didn’t vote for Flippo, the first time in his life he didn’t vote Republican.
He invited reporter Noah Lanard and producer Sam Van Pykeren to his Nevada home this week, days ahead of the midterm elections, to explain why.
“I don’t want to sit here after the fact and go, ‘well, I was a loyal troop,’” Amodei said of not voting for a nominee from his own party. “You know who will care about that after the fact? Nobody.” Instead, Amodei said, he voted for Lynn Chapman, an independent candidate.
Nevada’s second congressional district has only had four representatives since its creation in the ’80s—and they’ve all been Republicans. But that could change next week. As Noah previously reported:
Flippo is locked in an unusually competitive race against Democrat Teresa Benitez-Thompson in a sprawling district encompassing Reno. Flippo’s hard-right candidacy and status as a recent transplant to Reno have divided Nevada Republicans. Mark Amodei, who is retiring from the seat Flippo hopes to win, called him a “fraud” in an article about the Bronze Star claims and refused to back him in both the primary and general election. Due to his vulnerabilities, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee recently added this deep red district to its “Red to Blue” program, identifying it as a possible flip opportunity.
In light of a laundry list of controversies Flippo faces, Amodei has repeatedly called the retired Air Force officer and licensed financial adviser a “fraud.”
Since 2023, Flippo repeatedly failed to file required financial disclosures that would illuminate his financial position. Then there’s the case of Flippo’s military record. For years, Flippo wore a hat that suggested he earned the Bronze Star with valor—the rare award he admits he does not have. When pressed on the V-shaped hat accessories, which are used by the US military to show when awards are earned for valor, Flippo claimed his grandchildren had attached the emblems.
“Yeah, right.” Amodei told Mother Jones. “You put those on there. Sorry! Speculation on my part.”
Flippo also has close ties to a dubious company run by an businessman who has been accused of fraud in court records. Flippo has benefited from hundreds of thousands of dollars in political donations from the company, Arizona Land Reserve, and people in the company’s orbit. And previously unreported records obtained by Mother Jones show Flippo was fired as a financial adviser in 2024 after being accused of “willful misrepresentations and/or omissions of material fact”—a firing Flippo has previously downplayed.
“Nowhere in those oaths does it say ignore the candidate who appears to have some material defects and just, you know, be a good Republican,” Amodei said.
