CHARLESTON, S.C. — Pete Buttigieg's campaign is questioning the results of Nevada’s Democratic caucus, alleging anomalies in data and errors in reporting.

"Given how close the race is between second and third place, we ask that you take these steps before releasing any final data," the campaign wrote late Saturday in a letter to the Nevada State Democratic Party.

Molly Forgey, a party spokeswoman, said that the officials were "continuing to verify and to report results," adding, "As laid out in our recount guidance, there is a formal method for requesting a challenge of results."

With over half of Saturday's results reported by the party as of Sunday afternoon, Buttigieg advisers maintain that the former mayor will finish in second, or closer to second than the results currently indicate, after the full and accurate accounting of results.

"Currently our data shows that this is a razor-thin margin for second place in Nevada, and due to irregularities and a number of unresolved questions we have raised with the Nevada Democratic Party, it’s unclear what the final results will be," Deputy Campaign Manager Hari Sevugan said in a statement.

Read more here.

LAS VEGAS — Elizabeth Warren's longstanding truce with Bernie Sanders came apart in the days preceding the Nevada caucuses. But the push came too late, with her campaign now on life support after disappointing finishes in the three early states.

Sanders won a dominant victory in Nevada, with the Massachusetts senator coming in fourth after she spent the preceding week throwing caution to the wind, for the first time making an explicit case for why the Vermont senator should not be the Democratic presidential nominee.

She took him to task for a lack of transparency on his health records, for the ugly behavior of some of his supporters, for refusing to call for abolishing the Senate filibuster, and for his campaign's negativity toward others on Medicare for All. She even criticized him by name after months of contrasts that were too subtle to make an impression on many voters.

Some Democrats wonder why she waited so long.

Read more here.

Warren sharply criticized Bloomberg while addressing supporters in Washington on Saturday night, taking a Trump-like swing at the New York billionaire.

"I want to talk specifically for just a minute at the top, about a threat that is coming our way. And it's a big threat. Not a tall one but a big one: Michael Bloomberg," she said.

Trump frequently pokes fun of Bloomberg's height, which recently released medical records show is 5'7.

Warren also criticized Bloomberg for trying to "buy this election" and for his record on race and gender.

"Billionaire who hides his taxes, has a bad history with women, and defends racist policies," she said. "Let me just put it this way: we're not substituting one arrogant billionaire for another in 2020."

She added, "Michael Bloomberg is the riskiest candidate for the Democrats because he cannot win against Donald Trump."

Speaking with reporters on the flight from Nevada to Colorado following his caucus speech, Buttigieg emphasized the need to do well in the upcoming nominating contests. 

"Obviously South Carolina’s an opportunity to demonstrate that our coalition is broader than people thought, as I believe is happening in Nevada," he said. "We’ve got to have a good showing in Super Tuesday, it’s why we’re pushing so hard to make sure we have the resources to win."

Asked about the ads his campaign has started running in South Carolina, hitting Sanders on healthcare, Buttigieg said, "He’s the frontrunner right now, and we need to make sure that we challenge his vision because I think it’s a vision that most Democrats and certainly most Americans don’t share."

Polls show that a majority of Democratic voters in Iowa, New Hampshire and Nevada are in favor of Medicare for All, Sanders' signature policy proposal. The Vermont senator won New Hampshire and Nevada and was a close runner-up in Iowa.

Tom Steyer sounded an optimistic note about his less-than-top-tier finish in Nevada on Saturday night, telling supporters in remarks that lasted only a few minutes that he was "really, really proud" of how he was doing as results trickled in and "really thrilled" about what his campaign had accomplished.

The billionaire activist said he believed “more strongly than ever in what we are fighting for” and that he can see “why we are the answer to the Democratic question of who can beat Trump.”

Although results were still coming in, Steyer said he thought he was "going to have a good night" and "this is the start of us moving up.” He added, “I think what we are going to see is, as we get into diverse America, we do better and better and better” and predicted a strong performance next Saturday in South Carolina.

“Tonight is the start, next Saturday is the next step, and then Super Tuesday is when we prove it,” Steyer said before telling the crowd that he was catching an overnight flight to South Carolina and to “have fun tonight."

"So let's get ready for that," he said about the upcoming contest. "Let's take credit for what happened, and then let's build on it and keep going."

Elizabeth Warren congratulated Bernie Sanders on his Nevada victory during a campaign rally in Seattle on Saturday evening. 

"Thank you Nevada for keeping me in the fight. The results have come in Bernie won," Warren said. "Congratulations, Bernie." 

Despite her cordial opening, Warren did not shy away from criticizing the night's big winner.

"Bernie says we're going to keep the filibuster. I say Mitch McConnell is not going to get a veto over what we do," Warren said. "I am not in this fight to talk about change. I am in this fight to make change."

Warren, who has underperformed in early nominating contests, reassured her supporters that the race was not yet a done deal. 

“Since Wednesday night, our support has been growing everywhere,” she said, highlighting the $9 million her campaign has raised since her strong Las Vegas debate performance earlier this week. 

“We have a lot of states to go, and right now I can feel the momentum,” Warren said.

LAS VEGAS — Put "Bernie Bros" on the back-burner.

It's the army of sobrinos and sobrinas — the Spanish words for nephews and nieces — who should strike fear in the hearts of Bernie Sanders' rivals for the Democratic presidential nomination and party elites after he ran up the score among Latino voters in the Nevada caucuses Saturday. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., and other Latinx backers of Sanders refer to him fondly as their "tío," or uncle.

Sanders was the choice of 54 percent of Hispanic caucus-goers Saturday on his way to steamrolling to the most convincing victory of the primary season, according to an NBC entrance poll. His closest competitor, former Vice President Joe Biden, racked up 14 percent, with no other candidate cracking double digits.

Those results signaled that the energy Sanders has poured into building a more diverse coalition than his failed 2016 campaign is paying off at just the right time. He can now stake the first claim — less than two weeks before the "Super Tuesday" contests in 14 states — to having won a state where white, Hispanic and black voters are all represented in substantial numbers.

Read the full analysis here.

Multiple Nevada caucus precinct chairs told NBC News that they had to wait anywhere from 20 minutes to 2 hours to phone in their site results due to jammed hotlines Saturday.

“It just beeped the whole time,” said Ashlyne Rose, a 20-year-old nursing student and precinct chair.

Two chairs interviewed by NBC News said that the Nevada Democratic Party had texted them Saturday afternoon to provide the phone number they were supposed to use to report results. But when the time came, several chairs tried repeatedly to get through and were initially unable to do so.

Around 5 p.m. ET, or 2 p.m. local time, the party sent a second text message with three additional phone numbers to call. “Thanks so much for your hard work. If you haven’t reported yet, you can call any of the following numbers to do so,” the message read. “If you don’t reach us right away, we’ll give you a call back to take your results.”

Calling those numbers resulted in being placed on hold for up to 20 minutes for some chairs, but the chairs said they were eventually able to report their results.

During the Iowa caucuses on two weeks ago, results were delayed for hours as an app coding issue and overwhelmed phone lines bogged down reporting. There was no evidence of any issue on a similar magnitude in Nevada and caucus managers said they weren’t overly concerned.

"I wasn’t really worried, I just thought I would call in a bit after calls went through," Rose said.

Gary Reese, a 65-year-old government worker, arrived a precinct in Elko County as an observer and was quickly pressed into service as a precinct chair due to a shortage of volunteers.

"First time I called I got a disconnected tone, like the line is not in service," Reese said.

Eventually he was told to go home and keep trying from there. He never received the secondary list of phone numbers because he was a day-of volunteer and neither the site lead nor the Democratic Party had his information. Around 7:15 p.m. ET, or 4:15 p.m. local time, he was able to submit his results via the original phone number.

Not everyone had to wait, however. Another precinct chair told NBC News they were able to report in results without issue on the original phone number. 

Molly Forgey, the Nevada Democratic Party spokesperson, told NBC News in an email that the party had prepared "all along for a high influx of results as caucuses wrap up, and we’re working diligently to accommodate and continue processing the high volume of incoming results from precinct chairs."

Mike Bloomberg's campaign manager, Kevin Sheekey, blasted Bernie Sanders following the results of the Nevada caucuses, saying that nominating the Vermont senator would be a "fatal error" for Democrats.

"The Nevada results reinforce the reality that this fragmented field is putting Bernie Sanders on pace to amass an insurmountable delegate lead," Sheekey said. "This is a candidate who just declared war on the so-called 'Democratic establishment.'"

"We are going to need Independents AND Republicans to defeat Trump — attacking your own party is no way to get started," Sheekey said. "As Mike says, if we choose a candidate who appeals to a small base — like Senator Sanders — it will be a fatal error."

Unlike in primary elections, higher-tier candidates can pick up extra support during the Nevada caucuses. This is because candidates that do not have support from at least 15 percent of caucus-goers in the first alignment are eliminated.

Here’s a look at the support levels each candidate received during the alignments. Note that the percent reported displayed here represents the number of precincts that have reported its initial and reallocated numbers.

This chart will update as more results come in. See the full results on NBC News' Nevada election results page.

Valeria  Romano said she could see a difference when she was knocking on Latinos' doors for Bernie Sanders in this election compared to 2016. People were more responsive, paying attention, and many were in agreement with her support for Sanders.

"I did’t think it was going to happen, that we were going to have this kind of lead," Romano told NBC News.

"It proves to me that the last election wasn’t in vain," she said. "It was just the beginning. Now we’re seeing how it's going to turn out and people are going to pay attention now. Bernie has woken up so many minds and that gives me hope especially for the future."

Romano, 32, is a mother of two with another child on the way, and she works one job at a retail art supply store and a second job selling her screen printings. Yet she increased her work on Sanders' behalf for this campaign to help get more Latinos to vote for him and increase the community's influence in picking a presidential nominee. 

In 2016, people in the community knew Sanders only as "el hombre con el pelo (the man with the hair)," she said after NBC News projected Sanders as the caucus winner. "People really knew him this time. He was Tío (uncle) Bernie or El Quemazon (the burn), a moniker that became a corrido or ballad.

Sanders' campaign was on the ground early and has integrated outreach to Latino voters throughout the campaign, said Chuck Rocha, Sanders' campaign adviser. The campaign has spent millions to reach new Latino voters and those that have not voted often. It hired 200 staff in Nevada, about a third of whom are Latino, almost all of them bilingual, Rocha said. 

Rocha said he'd been consistently targeting 100,000 Latinos — over 50,000 more than those who caucused in the last election or who regularly vote. Sanders' finish in Nevada shows that "early intentional investments can deliver the Latino vote," he said.

"We won the Nevada caucus by historic margins by incorporating Latinos into leadership and every part of the campaign," he said. 

"Every time I'm with him (Sanders), he turns to me and says, 'Chuck, tell me what we are doing to get the Latinos out,'" he said. 

Showing his intention to keep trying to rally Latinos, Sanders gave his victory speech in San Antonio, Texas, a heavily Latino city and home of former presidential candidate Julián Castro.

Bernie Sanders celebrated his decisive victory in the Nevada caucuses on Saturday, introducing his wife Jane Sanders to an energized crowd in San Antonio, Texas, as “the next first lady.” 

“Let me introduce to you the next first lady,” Sanders said, as he took the stage to a cheering crowd of supporters. “You will be very proud of her as first lady.” 

“Let me thank the people of Nevada for their support," Sanders continued, touting a "multi-generational and multi-racial coalition" that not only delivered a victory to him tonight, but “is going to sweep this country.”

Sanders was in Texas campaigning ahead of the Lone Star State's primary on Super Tuesday, March 3. 

“Don't tell anybody I don't want to get them nervous,” Sanders said. “We are going to win the Democratic nomination in Texas.”

Sander poked fun at President Donald Trump, who had been tweeting about the Vermont senator as caucus results rolled in.

“The president gets very, very upset easily so don't tell him we are going to beat him here in Texas,” Sanders said.

After Bernie Sanders became the projected winner in Nevada, the powerful Culinary Workers Union in the state released a statement that said they remained focused on defeating Donald Trump in the fall and "securing healthcare for all, while maintaining a choice for Culinary Union members to keep what we’ve built in 85 years."

The statement is of note as the union released a thinly veiled attack on Sanders for his Medicare for All plan that they claimed would "end Culinary health care" ahead of the caucuses. The group did not endorse any candidate. 

The union's broadside, however, gained national attention, and the organization later called the backlash from Sanders' supporters for their stance "vicious." The fracas opened a new avenue for criticism from his opponents and forced Sanders to share his support for the group.

While the union did say that their other platform issue would remain "Defeating Trump on Election Day," it remains to be seen if they will fully get behind a Sanders' candidacy. 

Pete Buttigieg congratulated Sen. Bernie Sanders for winning the Nevada caucuses on Saturday — and then said he thought the Democratic frontrunner is so divisive that he could lead the party to defeat in November. 

"Before we rush to nominate Senator Sanders, let's take a sober look at what’s at stake," Buttigieg told supporters. 

"Senator Sanders believes in an inflexible, ideological revolution that leaves out most Democrats, not to mention most Americans," the former South Bend, Indiana, mayor said, adding that Sanders has "a vision of capitalism as the root of all evil."

Buttigieg also suggested that having Sanders on top of the Democratic ticket would lead to defeat in House and Senate races. 

“I believe the only way to truly deliver any of the progressive changes we care about is to be a nominee who actually gives a damn about the effect you are having, from the top of the ticket, on those crucial, frontline House and Senate Democrats running to win,” he said. 

"We can prioritize either ideological purity or inclusive victory. We can either call people names online or call them into our movement," he continued, adding, "I believe the best way to defeat Donald Trump and deliver for the American people is to broaden and galvanize the majority that supports us."  

"This is our only shot to defeat Donald Trump," he said. "Let's make sure we get this choice right." 

Buttigieg's remarks drew criticism from New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, a Sanders supporter, who said the former South Bend mayor was speaking "for the American elite, not the majority."

De Blasio, who briefly ran for president himself, tweeted at Buttigieg again a few minutes later, calling him "smug" and saying he needed to show "humility."

While early returns show Joe Biden running well behind Sen. Bernie Sanders in Nevada, the former vice president told supporters in Las Vegas "I feel really good" about the results. 

"You know, I know we don't have the final results yet, but I feel really good. You put me in a position — you know, the press is ready to declare people dead quickly, but we're alive and we're coming back and we're going to win," Biden told his cheering supporters, including one who yelled that Biden is "the comeback kid."

"Y’all did it for me. Now we're going to go to South Carolina and win and take this back," Biden said. 

NBC News projects Bernie Sanders has won the the Nevada Democratic caucuses. It remains too early to call second and third-place finishers.

As the results from Nevada's Democratic caucuses trickled in Saturday night, President Donald Trump was officially awarded all of the state Republican party's 25 delegates.

The state party had already canceled its caucuses, and voted by acclimation on Saturday to give Trump all of the delegates, executive director Will Sexauer told The Associated Press. 

The Nevada numbers give Trump 86 of the 87 Republican delegates awarded to date. Former Massachusetts Gov. William Weld won one delegate in Iowa. 

Amy Klobuchar told her supporters at a rally in her native Minneapolis that she had once again "exceeded expectations" in the race for the Democratic nomination as she tried to polish what entrance polling and initial results appear to indicate will be a finish outside the top tier in Nevada. 

It's too early to call where candidates placed behind NBC News' projected winner, Bernie Sanders.

Departing the Silver State before results came in on Saturday, Klobuchar flew to her home in Minnesota — a Super Tuesday state with 75 pledged delegates — to participate in early voting, encourage her supporters to do the same and emphasize that her campaign is keeping its head above water. 

"I always note that a lot of people didn't even think that I would still be standing at this point. They didn't think I'd make it through that speech in the snow," she said, referring to the winter conditions she dealt with when announcing her candidacy. "They didn't think I'd make it to the debate floor. But time and time again, because of all of you and because of the people around this country that want something different than the guy in the White House, we have won."

Klobuchar then outlined her plan for the coming days, including rallies in North Dakota, Oklahoma, Arkansas and South Carolina and further distanced herself from her progressive opponents, reiterating her belief that she can be the unity candidate with a centrist view. 

She noted that President Donald Trump had even name-checked her at a rally this week, which she said was a "badge of honor" and meant that "you know I've arrived now."

"Donald Trump’s worst nightmare is that the people in the middle, the people who are tired of the mudslinging and the name-calling, will have a place to call home this November and that has been our mission from the beginning," she said.  

Bernie Sanders has won the Nevada Democratic caucuses, according to an NBC News projection.

Sanders rode a wave of support from young voters, Latinos and first-time caucusgoers to a runaway first-place finish in the state Saturday. The big win could give Sanders momentum heading into next Saturday's primary in South Carolina, where polls show him running a close second to Joe Biden.

Sanders, looking to lock up a commanding delegate lead in his quest for the nomination, has also been devoting more time in California, the state that offers the largest prize on Super Tuesday, March 3.

It's too early to call a second-place finisher.

The share of Democrats participating in their first presidential caucus in Nevada today was down compared to four years ago, according to the NBC News Entrance Poll. That makes the Silver State the third in a row in which first-time voters make up a smaller share of the Democratic electorate in 2020 than in 2016.

About half of those participating in Nevada on Saturday were first-time caucusgoers; that’s down from 62 percent in 2016. This drop echoes the slight decline in first-time voters seen in the New Hampshire Democratic primary and in the Iowa Democratic caucuses. 

As Democratic caucusgoers prepared to participate in Saturday’s Nevada contest, most expressed optimism that votes would be counted correctly, according to the NBC News Entrance Poll. More than 4 in 5 participants were confident in a correct count.

Those who were skeptical of an accurate count heavily favored Bernie Sanders: He won the support of more than half of these voters.

Voters’ confidence may end up being shaken by the fact that four hours after the caucuses began, few votes had been officially tallied by the state’s Democratic Party. Anecdotal reports indicated that confusion was delaying the reporting of results at several precincts across the state.

President Donald Trump tuned into the Nevada Democratic caucuses on Saturday, tweeting that "Crazy Bernie" was doing well and telling the Vermont senator, "Don't let them take it away from you!"

"Looks like Crazy Bernie is doing well in the Great State of Nevada. Biden & the rest look weak, & no way Mini Mike can restart his campaign after the worst debate performance in the history of Presidential Debates," Trump tweeted, short before NBC News projected Sanders would win. "Congratulations Bernie, & don't let them take it away from you!"

Since the 2016 primary, Trump has frequently suggested that the Democratic National Committee is working against Sanders to keep him from winning the party's nomination.

Read the story.

LAS VEGAS — More than 80 people participated in the caucus at Rancho High School near downtown Las Vegas, where Sanders appeared to be doing well.

"I feel great," said Mario Vivales, who cast his vote for the Vermont senator and said he believes the caucus process went smoothly. "I saw Bernie jumping ahead of everyone." 

Most of the volunteers running the caucus there were high school students between 15 to 18 years old.

“This is the next generation,” said Yesenia Moya, 30, who was the temporary precinct chair. “I’m proud to be a part of this today.”

Glady Ayala,15, and Evelyn Pena, 16, volunteered in their first caucus this year. Both girls are Rancho High School students.

“I thought it was a really good opportunity to try something new,” Ayala said.

Pena said it was pretty stressful because participants wanted things to go faster.

“We were trying our best," she said. "We are new to this.”

The best part of the day, they said, was meeting Nevada Gov. Steve Sisolak and first lady Kathy Sisolak.

LAS VEGAS — NBC News entrance or exit polls find that Medicare for All is supported by large majorities of Democratic voters in Iowa (57 percent support to 38 percent opposition), New Hampshire (58 percent support to 37 percent opposition) and Nevada (62 percent support to 35 percent opposition).

That helps explain the strength of Bernie Sanders in all three states and indicates that rival candidates who staked their primary campaigns on opposing Medicare for All — most notably Joe Biden and Pete Buttigieg — may have miscalculated. Many Democratic voters in 2020 are less interested in candidates who talk about what is politically possible and more interested in candidates who seek to change what is possible.

An educational divide separates the Nevada supporters of Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren, the two leading liberal contenders for the Democratic presidential nomination, results from the NBC News Entrance Poll show.

The Massachusetts senator drew her strongest support in Nevada from the most educated caucusgoers. She received 19 percent of the vote among those with an advanced degree. But at each step of the education ladder below this level, Warren did worse: She bottomed out at 8 percent among those who have never attended college.

Sanders did better than Warren among Nevada voters at every education level, but his pattern was the reverse of hers. Among Democratic caucusgoers who have never attended college, he was favored by nearly half. Sanders’ support was reduced at each additional level of educational attainment; he and Warren ran virtually neck-and-neck among those with an advanced degree.

It was the luck of the draw for Pete Buttigieg at a Nevada caucus on Saturday. Literally.

At the North Valleys High School caucus site in Reno, Buttigieg's supporters drew from a card deck the number 3, while Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders' backers picked a 2, breaking a delegate tie between the candidates and making the former South Bend, Indiana, mayor the winner of this caucus location.

The Nevada Democratic Party has used a deck of cards to break ties since 2008. Per party rules, if two caucus groups are tied, then representatives from each candidate draws a single card from a deck in order to break the tie. The winner is the high card, with aces the highest.

Read the story.

More than half of Nevadans participating in Saturday's Democratic presidential caucuses support "Medicare for All," according to results from the NBC News Entrance Poll. A signature policy proposal of Bernie Sanders, Medicare for All would replace Americans’ private health insurance with a single government plan. 

Medicare for All’s numbers in Nevada are similar to those seen in the other two 2020 Democratic presidential contests so far, in New Hampshire and Iowa. 

Bernie Sanders' popularity in parts of the Latino community was clear at a caucus site in east Las Vegas, showing how much his campaign has penetrated into the community.

Sanders came out on top of each of four precincts that met in the Desert Pines High School's cafeteria and often was 10 points or more ahead of the second place candidate, who was Joe Biden in three precincts and Tom Steyer in a fourth. 

Although Sanders registers high support with young Latinos, the in-person caucusgoers were a mix of younger and middle-aged people.

Early votes appeared to help Sanders put distance between himself and other candidates. In one of the precincts, 18 people showed up to caucus, but 63 people voted early, according to initial calculations. In the precinct's unofficial results, Sanders got 16 people in the room and 40 early voters, while Biden got one vote in the room and 18 early voters. One caucusgoer who initially was for Pete Buttigieg chose to be uncommitted after Buttigieg failed to get enough votes to be viable.

Sabryna Gomez, 18, who attended her first caucus, initially caucused for Tom Steyer. She said she had seen him on the news and he encouraged her to come out for him. But Steyer was not viable in her precinct, so she switched her vote to Sanders. 

Javier Galvez, 35, was the only in-person caucusgoer to choose Biden and was not joined by anyone on the second round. But early votes kept Biden in the race.

"I'm glad I was able to help push him over the top to be a viable candidate," Galvez said. 

In another precinct, Alejandra Romero, 28, a student at the University of Nevada Las Vegas campus, said she was thrilled with the support for Sanders in her precinct. 

"I had a lot of faith in our community. I went with my heart first. In our community, we are clear on the principles and values wanted from a candidate," she said. Sanders' values "are very clear, and right now the stakes are too high." 

Joe Biden leads among black participants in Saturday's Nevada Democratic caucuses, with Bernie Sanders in second place, results from the NBC News Entrance Poll show. The Vermont senator sits solidly in first place among the state’s Latino voters.

Entrance poll results show Biden with 36 percent of the black vote at Nevada's caucuses and Sanders with 27 percent. In third place is billionaire Tom Steyer, followed by Sen. Elizabeth Warren. Black voters made up about 1 in 10 participants at the Nevada caucuses.

Sanders is clearly leading his rivals among Nevada’s Latino Democrats, who made up about 1 in 5 caucusgoers. He’s winning about half of the Latino vote, leaving Biden, Pete Buttigieg, Steyer and Warren far behind.

Sanders has built a slimmer lead among Nevada’s white Democratic caucusgoers (65 percent of Saturday's electorate), receiving nearly 3 in 10 of their votes. That’s 9 points ahead of Buttigieg, his closest rival in this group. 

Bernie Sanders didn't take time to gloat in Nevada on Saturday despite boasting what appears to be a healthy early lead in initial preference results, largely because of support from young, liberal voters. 

Instead, the Vermont senator stumped in Texas, looking toward the Super Tuesday contest and the 228 delegates to win there. His Democratic opponents, meanwhile, tried to boost their support at numerous caucus locations across the Silver State.

Hundreds of people came to see Sanders in El Paso, where the presidential nominee directed most of his political fire at President Donald Trump and the wealthy rather than the Democrats he's currently running against. At the top, Sanders emphasized that his campaign was about "us, not me."

"When I look out at this audience, I have absolute confidence that we can create a government that is based on compassion, it’s based on love, it’s based on truth, not what we have now of greed, corruption and lies," Sanders said, adding that President Donald Trump "is a pathological liar, who is running a corrupt administration, who is a racist, a sexist, a homophobe, a xenophobe and a religious bigot."

Sanders then hit on some of his favored policy topics, including raising the minimum wage, defending women's rights, addressing climate change, supporting unions, overhauling the criminal justice system, providing universal childcare, canceling student debt and pushing for Medicare for All. 

"Let's transform this country!" Sanders yelled at the end of the speech to cheers from his supporters. 

The most powerful union in Nevada, the culinary workers, came out hard against Sanders with a thinly veiled attack on his Medicare for All health insurance proposal. But Sanders is expected to do well here, as he did in Iowa, despite significant pushback from labor leadership. Of course, not all unions oppose Sanders' plans — or have the same degree of opposition — but some of the biggest unions have gone as far as they feel they can in trying to turn M4A into a loser for him. 

That's bad news for the suits who make decisions about what unions will do in the political realm. If Sanders can withstand such attacks, it suggests he's closer to the workers than their own union leaders. And that will increasingly force labor leaders to decide whether they want to risk further exposing rifts between themselves and their members on one of the most important issues for those members.

Rather than counter-punching against unions that share much of his agenda on other matters, Sanders has chosen to show his strength without further alienating the brass. If he wins the Democratic nomination, he'll need the force of major labor unions to help him against Trump, and the decision to play this fight more subtly is a sign of political sophistication on his part.

Because they share a lot of constituents, there's not much upside to either labor leaders or Sanders in a protracted or ugly war. If his performances in Nevada and Iowa get his detractors in the labor movement to back off — and there are signs that might happen — he'll be in an even stronger position going forward.

At Rancho High School near downtown Las Vegas, most of the volunteers running the caucus were high school students.

The students were between 15 to 18 years old.

"This is the next generation," said Yesenia Moya, 30, who was the temporary precinct chair. "I’m proud to be a part of this today."

Latino voters account for 1 in 5 participants in Saturday’s Nevada Democratic presidential caucuses. They are substantially younger and less likely to hold a college degree than white Nevada Democrats — and are more likely to be attending a Democratic caucus for the first time, early results from the NBC News Entrance Poll show.

More than half of Latino Democratic caucusgoers are under age 45, compared to just a third of white caucusgoers. Nearly two-thirds of Nevada’s Latino voters are participating in a Democratic caucus for the first time; that’s true for less than half of white voters.

Among Latinos at Saturday’s Democratic caucuses, 78 percent support replacing private health insurance with a single government-run plan, a substantially higher share than among white voters (60 percent).

Entrance poll results indicate that Bernie Sanders enjoys a wide lead among Nevada's Latino caucusgoers. 

Longtime Republican Clint Eastwood is pulling support from Donald Trump in the 2020 election. In an interview with the Wall Street Journal, the actor-director signaled that he thinks a different candidate would be the better choice.

"The best thing we could do is just get Mike Bloomberg in there," he said.

After endorsing Mitt Romney and famously delivering a speech at the 2012 Republican National Convention to an empty chair that represented Barack Obama, Eastwood never officially backed Trump. In a 2016 interview, he expressed displeasure with Trump and Hillary Clinton, saying there's "much funny business on both sides of the aisle."

Read what else the actor and filmmaker said.

Early exit polls show Sanders winning 51 percent, a slight majority, of Latino voters in the Nevada caucuses. In a two-person race, that lead wouldn't be such a big deal. In the scramble that is the Democratic nomination contest, it's a huge figure with magnified implications for the Super Tuesday delegate chase coming up in about 10 days.

Here's why: Fourteen of the 53 House districts in California are Hispanic-majority, and more than half of them have Latino populations exceeding 35 percent. If California Latinos and Latinas vote like their counterparts in Nevada, Sanders is in great shape to dominate many of those districts and net a large number of delegates out of them collectively.

A similar dynamic is at play in Texas, where district-level delegates are decided by state Senate seats rather than congressional seats. In the Lone Star state, 7 of the state's 31 districts are Hispanic-majority, and many others have significant Latino influence.

Sanders is holding a rally in Texas Saturday afternoon.

Amy Klobuchar said she's a viable candidate no matter what happens Saturday, Joe Biden pivoted to his fundraising and Elizabeth Warren literally jogged away and yelled "back to the car" after reporters asked each nominee how they were feeling about their chances as the initial results for the Nevada caucuses began to trickle in.

The three top candidates seemed to be tempering expectations before there is a clear outcome, and many pointed to future contests and their investments in other upcoming states' contests. Early results in Nevada indicate Bernie Sanders had a significant advantage over the other contenders in Saturday's race.

But while Klobuchar, Warren and Biden were still in Nevada visiting caucus locations, it appeared the Vermont senator had already shifted his gaze to Super Tuesday and left for El Paso, Texas, where he was scheduled to hold a rally in the late afternoon. 

LAS VEGAS — Voters were turning out for the Nevada caucuses on Saturday, but there was a lack of volunteers to meet them at some polling locations.

At Rancho High School, a caucus location with 11 precincts just outside of Las Vegas, almost all of the volunteers were high school students, many of whom are unable to vote themselves because of their age. The only adult that NBC News spotted working at the site was the caucus lead — the school's social studies teacher. The students were only trained Friday night, and officials were actively looking for more adult volunteers to help coach the teens through the process.

At another precinct near the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, a state Democratic official told campaign representatives that there weren't enough volunteers statewide, and that the campaigns might have to staff voting locations themselves.

Read more here.

Black and Latino voters — who make up a bigger share of the electorate in Saturdays’s Nevada Democratic caucuses compared to previous 2020 contests — are more likely to call themselves “moderate” or “conservative” than white Democrats, early results from the NBC News Entrance Poll show.

Half of black Democrats in Nevada said they are either moderate or conservative, as did about 4 in 10 Latinos. Just 3 in 10 white Nevada Democratic caucusgoers said the same. 

Overall, Nevada’s Democratic electorate leans liberal. Two-thirds of Saturday’s caucusgoers said they are “very” or “somewhat” liberal — a share comparable to Democratic voters earlier this month in Iowa (68 percent) and New Hampshire (61 percent).

Three supporters Tulsi Gabbard sit alone in her section of the Nevada Democratic Caucus at Cheyenne High School in North Las Vegas, Nevada.

Elizabeth Warren's performance in Wednesday’s Democratic presidential debate failed to sway many late-deciding voters in Saturday’s Nevada Democratic caucuses.

Early results from the NBC News Entrance Poll show Warren in third place — at 17 percent — among Nevada Democrats who say they decided on their vote in the last few days; Bernie Sanders holds a thin lead among this group. Warren's performance among these voters isn't that different from her fourth-place standing among earlier deciders; 11 percent of those who decided before the last few days supported her. 

According to NBC News, the race is currently too early to call, but Sanders has a significant lead in the initial preference vote based on early entrance polls.

While visiting a caucus site in Las Vegas, Biden was greeted by supporters including Tina Edwards, a retiree, who became overwhelmed with emotions when she saw Biden. “Mr. Joe Biden! I love you! Oh my goodness,” she said before embracing him and crying.

After her emotional encounter with Biden, Edwards told reporters off-camera that the former VP needs "to be my president" because she doesn’t "want to have to go through another four years of drinking" with President Donald Trump.

Former Vice President Joe Biden said Saturday afternoon at a caucus location in Las Vegas that the Democratic primary is a battle over "what direction we take as a party." 

Biden made the comment when asked if the primary is a battle over the soul of the Democratic Party.

"I think it matters a lot, whether or not what direction we take as a party," he told reporters after spending some time shaking hands and mingling with caucusgoers. 

Biden said that the most important thing voters are looking for is "authenticity," to be able to deliver what a candidate says they plan to do as president. 

"I mean it's just getting down to that, and that's the battle inside the party right now," he said. "And there is a lot of differences among us that are being made more obvious now." 

Asked if the former vice president had confidence in the caucus process, Biden said he would be able to answer that once it's over. “This is a complicated process ... " he said. "We’ll see.”

On whether he thinks he could beat Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., on Saturday, Biden spoke about electability and said polls show that the former vice president would not only defeat Trump in a general election, but he'd also be able to help Democrats pick up House and Senate seats.

Elizabeth Warren paid a visit to the Coronado High School caucus. She hugged supporters and shook their hands, thanking them for "participating in democracy."

"This is what it's all about," she said.

Pete Buttigieg visited Sierra Vista High School to meet with caucusgoers there.

Buttigieg says his focus for today is "making sure we have a very strong support and show well," especially considering this is the "most diverse electorate we’ve had yet." He called today a "great opportunity for us to show that broadening coalition." 

Joe Biden visited a caucus location in Las Vegas, spending time shaking hands and mingling with caucus-goers waiting to register. He spent roughly half an hour making his way through the lines of caucusgoers, snapping selfies and asking them for their support.

Bernie Sanders has a wide lead in the Nevada Democratic presidential caucuses among voters who prioritize a candidate who agrees with them on issues over someone who can beat President Donald Trump. 

Early results from the NBC News Entrance Poll show Sanders winning more than half of the initial preference votes among those who prioritize issues, far ahead of rivals Elizabeth Warren and Pete Buttigieg. According to NBC News, the race is currently too early to call, but Sanders has a significant lead in the initial preference vote based on early entrance polls.

Support for Sanders is more muted among Nevada Democrats who’d rather nominate a candidate who can beat Trump: Sanders is vying with moderate rivals Joe Biden and Pete Buttigieg for the lead with these voters.

LAS VEGAS — The Nevada Democratic caucus on Saturday is too early to call after precinct locations closed their doors, according to NBC News.

Bernie Sanders has a significant lead in the initial preference results based on early entrance polls, NBC News projected.

Sanders' projected lead in voters' initial preference came as doors at caucus sites across the state closed promptly at 3:00 p.m. ET (12:00 p.m. local time).

For the full story click here.

Bernie Sanders saw a groundswell of support from young, liberal voters in Saturday’s Nevada Democratic caucuses. Early results from the NBC News Entrance Poll show Sanders also found strong backing among the state’s Latino voters. According to NBC News, the race is currently too early to call but Sanders has a significant lead in the initial preference vote based on early entrance polls. 

Sanders is overwhelming his rivals among the state’s youngest caucusgoers, capturing the votes of two-thirds of those age 17 to 29. The Vermont senator is also the clear favorite of Nevada Latino Democrats, winning about half of their votes. And as in previous contests, Sanders has garnered wide support from voters describing themselves as “very liberal.” Roughly half of these caucusgoers named him their first choice. He’s also winning half the votes of participants who favor replacing private insurance with a single government plan.

Participants in Saturday's Democratic caucuses in Nevada are much more racially diverse than voters in any presidential contest so far this year, early results from the NBC News Entrance Poll show.

Seventeen percent of Democratic caucusgoers are Latino; 10 percent are black; and 34 percent in total are people of color. That’s a huge leap in diversity from the Democratic electorates in Iowa (where people of color made up just 9 percent of voters) and New Hampshire (11 percent).

Compared to the previous two states, Saturday’s Nevada electorate looks much more like Democrats nationwide: In 2018, 41 percent of those voting for Democratic congressional candidates were people of color.

Read more about the electorate's diversity.

LAS VEGAS — The Nevada caucuses, the third contest in the 2020 Democratic primary and a first test of candidates' support among a more diverse electorate, will kick off here soon, with Democrats across the nation closely watching how voters choose — and hoping the event doesn’t resemble the disaster that struck Iowa’s nominating contest earlier this month.

The call to caucus officially starts at precincts around the state at 3:00 p.m. ET (12:00 p.m. local time), with check-in having begun two hours earlier.

What happens after doors close is anyone’s guess.

The actual caucusing will conclude within the hour, and in theory, results could be available a short time after that.

But, politics watchers, citing the debacle in Iowa, aren’t necessarily counting on it.

Read more here.

At Rancho High School, a caucus location just outside of Las Vegas with 11 precincts, almost all the volunteers are high school students — many who aren't even old enough to vote and trained Friday night.

The only adult volunteer currently on hand is the caucus lead, who happens to be their social studies teacher.

They are actively looking for more adult volunteers here to coach the kids through the process. 

By Anna Sundberg

WASHINGTON — Twitter said it was suspending dozens of accounts that have been pushing content in favor of former New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg’s presidential campaign.

Twitter confirmed late Friday that it was suspending the accounts because it said that they were violating the platform’s manipulation and spam policies.

"We have taken enforcement action on a group of accounts for violating our rules against platform manipulation and spam," a Twitter spokesperson said.

Read more here.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren's presidential campaign said Saturday afternoon that it more than surpassed its fundraising goal ahead of the Nevada caucuses, raising more than $14 million before the primary.

The Democratic contender from Massachusetts' campaign tweeted that since it announced a goal of raising $7 million before the Nevada caucuses, it has raised more than double that amount.  

The tweet then leads to a fundraising page soliciting more donations from grassroots supporters.

The Nevada caucuses officially kicked off at 1 p.m. ET/10 a.m. PT on Saturday with voters checking in for the election contest at nearly 2,100 different sites across the state.

Voters will get to begin caucusing in just a couple hours at 3 p.m. ET/12 p.m. PT.

LAS VEGAS — Pigeons with tiny Make American Great Again hats glued to their heads were released in downtown Las Vegas this week in what appears to be a sarcastic statement of loyalty to President Donald Trump and a mock protest of Nevada's coming Democratic presidential caucuses.

A group calling itself P.U.T.I.N., Pigeons United To Interfere Now, claimed responsibility for the stunt. The pigeons were set loose Tuesday, according to the group.

Twenty-five pigeons were released, 24 of them wearing hats and one donning a Trump-style wig, the group said Thursday in an email to NBC News.

For the full story click here. 

Nevada Democrats say they registered more than 10,000 voters as Democrats during early voting.

As a reminder, almost 75,000 people early voted in the Nevada caucuses. There are currently almost 700,000 registered Democrats in all of Nevada, per the January 2020 Secretary of State info. 

After an app contributed to widespread problems with Iowa’s caucus reporting, Nevada Democrats scrapped plans to use similar apps made by the same developer. They’ve since turned to a homebrewed solution.

The counts and delegates will be calculated and assigned two ways: a paper “Math Poster” worksheet hung on the wall at the precinct locations, and an off-the-shelf Google Forms app loaded onto an iPad provided by the state party, according to publicly available caucus training slides prepared by the party. The party calls the Google system the “Caucus Calculator.”

Both the calculator system and the poster will be used to log caucusgoers and help calculate a candidate’s viability at each location. Each candidate must meet a precinct-specific minimum threshold of support to be considered viable.

Click here to read the full story.

LAS VEGAS — While Democratic voters here will flock to caucus sites to express their preference in their party’s nominating contest, Republican voters will go about their day as normal.

That’s because the Republican Party voted last year to cancel its caucus.

The decision was made to help clear the path to re-election for President Donald Trump. By canceling its caucus, the party ensures that voters don’t have the opportunity to formally put their support behind a different Republican candidate for president.

Click here for the full story.

LAS VEGAS — Nervous about another fiasco like Iowa's, Democrats here and nationally are going to extra lengths to try to avoid a breakdown in the caucus process that could delay results on Saturday.

Nevada Democrats have hired a professional call center with 200 paid operators and dedicated reporting lines to help take in results from caucus sites around the state, diverging from Iowa where lightly trained volunteers manned the phones and reported chaos and jammed phoned lines after an app that was supposed to process most of the results malfunctioned.

"We have been working around the clock to ensure that what happened in Iowa will not happen here, which is why we're taking no chances when it comes to reporting," Molly Forgey, spokesperson for the Nevada Democratic Party, told NBC News. She added that the steps taken should "ensure that our precinct chairs and site leads will be able to successfully report results on caucus day."

Click here to read the full story.

LAS VEGAS — Nevada kicks off a new phase of the Democratic presidential race Saturday as the first 2020 contest with an electorate that reflects the diversity of the party.

It could be a knockout round for candidates who fail to attract a broad coalition of voters. Whether or not it causes some of them to exit, Nevada will signify to voters in critical upcoming contests who is viable and who isn’t.

Polls say Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt. is the front-runner heading into the caucuses, with former Vice President Joe Biden, former South Bend, Indiana Mayor Pete Buttigieg, Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., businessman and philanthropist Tom Steyer and Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn., all in the hunt. Former New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg, who is surging in national surveys and had a rocky debate this week, is skipping the first four states and won't be on the ballot here.

Click here for five things to watch for as Nevada Democrats vote.

Sen. Bernie Sanders had a message for President Putin and Russia after being briefed that the Kremlin is attempting to help his campaign.

LAS VEGAS — A new early-voting system, high turnout and questions about a never-before-used digital tool being used to process results could threaten the success of the Nevada Democratic caucuses on Saturday, election experts told NBC News.

"I don't see how any technologist or any party official or any political scientist can promise that this will turn out OK," said Mark Lindeman, the director of science and technology policy for Verified Voting, a nonpartisan nonprofit group that advocates for election accuracy and transparency.

"There are too many tools and procedures that are being rolled out, some at the last minute," he continued. "And my impression is that the people on the ground who are charged with implementing these procedures and using these tools are not confident they can do it."

Lindeman added, "I hope that it goes better than Iowa, but it is definitely at risk for similar reasons."

Read more here.

Bernie Sanders on Thursday sought to ease tensions between his supporters and an influential Nevada union that exploded this week after the union publicly criticized his campaign's push for "Medicare for All."

The fracas prompted a number of the Democratic presidential contenders competing with the Vermont senator for the nomination to jump to the union's defense, after it said it had come under “vicious” attacks from Sanders supporters.

The public battle between Sanders supporters and Nevada's powerful culinary union, which represents 60,000 workers in the hospitality-industry dominated state, broke out after the union sent out a flyer Tuesday warning that Sanders’ Medicare for All plan would "end Culinary health care."

Read more here.

LAS VEGAS — José Ramirez used to go door to door preaching the word as a Jehovah's Witness. Now he's knocking on the doors of Latinos as a Bernie Sanders evangelist.

It's his second time working on Sanders' campaigns, and he has stepped up his game, from calling potential voters on Sanders' behalf in 2016 to block walking in Latino-heavy East Las Vegas.

"I will not let any opportunity pass by that I can [to] help elect Bernie," Ramirez said.

Early voting began Saturday in Nevada ahead of the state's caucus on Feb. 22nd, which will give Democrats their first substantial feedback from Latino voters on their presidential candidates.

While Latinos voted in Iowa and New Hampshire and efforts were made to increase participation, Nevada has a larger, far more active Latino electorate.

Nevada has made itself a key part of the Democratic process, not only as the first-in-the-West caucus, but also by showing how Democrats could win by harnessing Latino votes.

Click here to read more.

This is Nevada’s week to choose. Nevada, considered something of bellwether, will be the first Western state to assign its delegates for the 2020 presidential election when it holds completes its caucuses Saturday.

Unsurprisingly, many of its residents have already made a decision.

NBC News asked readers to share their innermost thoughts about the slate of Democrats and Republicans in the 2020 presidential race, and people in Nevada answered.

“None of these candidates are strong enough,” one reader wrote.

“I secretly hope some in the GOP stands up to impeach Trump,” another wrote.

Here’s what Nevadans really think about the candidates and the 2020 presidential election.

LAS VEGAS — Mike Bloomberg became a piñata, and Elizabeth Warren resurrected her feisty side.

The Democratic candidates formed a circular firing squad Wednesday night, with arrows flying in all directions and fights breaking out among a seemingly infinite permutation of candidates on matters from health care policy to lewd comments about women

The debate was not only Bloomberg's first time on a presidential debate stage; it was also the first night of his surging 2020 campaign that wasn't choreographed. The result: He faced direct criticism from rivals he has bested in recent polls. It was the most contentious evening of the nine faceoffs so far, coming three days before the candidates face the most diverse voting electorate yet in their quest to make Donald Trump a one-term president.

Here's a look at who was the most aggressive, who took the toughest punches and who missed their marks over the course of the debate, which was hosted by NBC News, MSNBC, Telemundo and The Nevada Independent.

Find out who won the debate here. 

For more debate coverage, check out the NBC News live blog or watch highlights below: