In the blazing sun of the Las Vegas desert, throngs of white and Latino university students gathered to hear Bernie Sanders offer promises of free college tuition and a higher minimum wage. Metres away in a university lecture hall, Pete Buttigieg was being grilled by an association of black law students over his record on race relations.

From the outset of Wednesday's boxing match of a debate in Las Vegas, Democrats piled on Mike Bloomberg and never relented, forcing the billionaire former New York mayor to clumsily explain his controversial stop-and-frisk policy, history of sexual harassment complaints from women and the exorbitant amount of his own fortune he has pumped into his campaign.

Nevada’s Democratic Party is scrambling to shore up the system that will be used to calculate the results of Saturday’s caucuses, hoping to avoid the chaos that plagued the race in Iowa and cast a shadow over the Democratic presidential nomination race.

From the outset of Wednesday's boxing match of a debate in Las Vegas, Democrats piled on Mike Bloomberg and never relented, forcing the billionaire former New York mayor to clumsily explain his controversial stop-and-frisk policy, history of sexual harassment complaints from women and the exorbitant amount of his own fortune he's pumped into his campaign.

From the outset of Wednesday's boxing match of a debate in Las Vegas, Democrats piled on Mike Bloomberg and never relented, forcing the billionaire former New York mayor to clumsily explain his controversial stop-and-frisk policy, history of sexual harassment complaints from women and the exorbitant amount of his own fortune he's pumped into his campaign.

The race is for second place in Saturday’s Democratic presidential caucuses in Nevada, as the months Sen. Bernie Sanders invested in organizing Latino voters here are making him the candidate to beat in the first voting state whose diverse electorate resembles California’s.

Former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg will make his debut on the national debate stage Wednesday at the Paris Las Vegas, a flashy location for a wealthy candidate who opted to skip Nevada and other early states in his late bid for the Democratic presidential nomination.

As the next contest pivots to Nevada, a racially diverse state where minority voters will play a significant role, a progressive group with a $50 million investment in the 2020 election cycle is pouring money and resources into state organizations to mobilize voters ahead of caucuses.

As the dust settles from Iowa, another caucus looms on the horizon.

In establishing the first states to vote in the Democratic presidential nomination campaign, the party selected four states representing each U.S. region. These events are almost like a preseason before the big contests in March such as Super Tuesday when California and Texas cast ballots. The four early states that select delegates in February start in the Midwest with the Iowa caucuses, move to the Northeast and the New Hampshire primary, head to the West and the Nevada caucuses, and end in the South with the South Carolina primary.

In establishing the first states to vote in the Democratic presidential nomination campaign, the party selected four states representing each U.S. region. These events are almost like a preseason before the big contests in March such as Super Tuesday when California and Texas cast ballots. The four early states that select delegates in February start in the Midwest with the Iowa caucuses, move to the Northeast and the New Hampshire primary, head to the West and the Nevada caucuses, and end in the South with the South Carolina primary.

In establishing the first states to vote in the Democratic presidential nomination campaign, the party selected four states representing each U.S. region.