Greg Kidd Is Running Again: His plans for Nevada are not what you heard.
Greg Kidd is running again for Nevada’s Second Congressional District, and his recent listening event and paid article made it clear what his strategy is, and it is not what you heard.
Jan 26, 2026
Greg Kidd is running again for Nevada’s Second Congressional District, and his recent paid article in This Is Reno makes that clear.
See link, Commentary: Why I’m running in 2026 (sponsored) by Greg Kidd
The piece, written in Kidd’s voice, frames his renewed campaign as a response to rising costs, economic anxiety, and dissatisfaction with both national politics and Nevada’s representation in Washington.
It also serves a second purpose: reintroducing Kidd to voters under a new political identity — as a Democrat — positioning him as a moderate, business-minded outsider.
That framing matters because Kidd ran in the district previously as an independent and lost. What we are seeing now is not a spontaneous civic awakening, but a carefully structured campaign restart.
Kidd’s Core Message: Costs, Discontent, and a Party Switch
In his article, Greg Kidd emphasizes cost-of-living pressures:
Wages that no longer cover rent
Rapidly rising housing costs in Washoe County
Higher grocery prices
Nevada’s unemployment challenges
He pairs those issues with a critique of national politics and his opponent, Mark Amodei, accusing him of failing to protect public lands, Medicaid funding, and Nevada’s economic future.
At the same time, Kidd explains his decision to register as a Democrat, presenting it less as an ideological shift and more as a rejection of what he describes as chaos and corruption in today’s Republican Party.
The message is calibrated for disaffected independents, moderate Democrats, and business-friendly voters who are uncomfortable with national politics but still wary of progressive economic policy.
A Vision, a Resume, and an Open Question
Greg Kidd’s renewed run for CD-2 blends these elements:
A populist cost-of-living message
A technocratic fintech growth vision
A personal narrative built around entrepreneurship
Rebranding as a Democrat, not an Independent
The listening event at Reno Public Market and the paid article announcing his campaign are best understood as the opening moves of that strategy — designed to reintroduce Kidd, redefine his political identity, and test whether this message resonates more strongly than in his previous run.
Greg Kidd at his listening event at Reno Public Market on January 21. He presents as a concerned, almost folksy guy, for a $Billionaire involved in digital currency operations.
A Listening Event — Or a Visibility Event?
Kidd recently hosted a “listening event” at Reno Public Market, which he promoted as an opportunity to hear directly from Nevadans.
In practice, events like this serve a familiar political function:
They generate early name recognition
They produce photos and social proof
They allow a candidate to appear engaged without taking hard policy positions
They provide content for fundraising and future outreach
This places the event squarely in the category of campaign awareness building, not neutral civic listening. The timing, paired with a paid campaign-style article, suggests the event was designed to signal that Kidd’s CD-2 campaign is back on track.
Greg Kidd and the Choice Between Managing Decline and Building Prosperity in Reno
I called this out in his campaign angle in the article I published the day before the event. I also said that Greg Kidd should be trying to bring jobs to Nevada. Apparently, he is now proposing to bring jobs, but with a twist.
The Fintech Pitch: What Kidd Is Actually Proposing
The distinctive part of Kidd’s campaign is his fintech vision for Nevada. Kidd argues that Nevada could become a national hub for digital payments and financial infrastructure, much as South Dakota became a hub for credit card banking.
He has previously supported state-level legislation — which did not pass — to create a legal framework for so-called “payment banks.”
The idea is not about retail banking. It is about settlement infrastructure—the back-end systems that support digital operations. It needs Federal legislation to succeed.
Greg Kidd will likely team up with Nevada Senators Jackie Rosen and Catherine Cortez Masto to push for the necessary Federal legislation.
What a Fintech Settlement Operation Looks Like
A fintech settlement operation is a highly regulated financial data center.
These operations typically include:
Secure computing infrastructure (Tier III or IV data centers)
Encrypted links to banks, card networks, and federal payment systems
24/7 monitoring through Network Operations Centers (NOCs)
Sophisticated FinTech software systems
Inside these facilities, money is:
Validated
Cleared
Netted
Settled between institutions
Just as important as the machines are the people:
Senior software and systems engineers
Cybersecurity specialists
Compliance officers
Anti-money-laundering (AML) analysts
Treasury and liquidity managers
These are high-salary, high-skill jobs. The Fintech operations are not labor-intensive. A settlement hub employs professionals at the highest levels of data center operations, computer networking, software administration, and financial oversight.
Greg Kidd’s Failed Run for Congress: A $9 Million Lesson in How Not to Run a Campaign
I wondered why Kidd kept the campaign going after spending $1 million after not advancing in the polls, and now we know that the stakes are so high that $9 is just a small investment towards his goal of building a Fintech operations empire.
What This Means for Nevada — And What It Doesn’t
If Nevada succeeds in attracting fintech settlement operations, the benefits would be focused.
What it could bring:
Some high-paying technical and finance jobs
Demand for specialized legal, accounting, and cybersecurity services related to financial operations
Data Center infrastructure investment out at TRIC or a similar location.
What it would not do:
Reduce housing costs
Lower grocery prices
Create broad employment for service or blue-collar workers
Function as a near-term cost-of-living fix
This is capital-intensive growth, not mass employment — a distinction ignored in campaign messaging. Greg’s Fintech plan will not benefit the people who came to his listening event at RPM.
A Personal Upside for Greg Kidd
If Nevada were to adopt fintech settlement or payment-bank legislation, Greg Kidd would be unusually well-positioned to benefit personally. Kidd has spent his career building companies in payments, financial infrastructure, and digital settlement.
If Nevada created a favorable regulatory framework for fintech settlement operations, it is reasonable to assume that Kidd would launch such an operation in the state.
These businesses are potentially very profitable. They are similar to Credit Card operations. A successful settlement operation can generate substantial long-term revenue with relatively limited staffing, though considerable investment in systems and data center infrastructure is required.
This introduces the alignment between public policy and private financial upside that voters should understand. Kidd’s proposal is not just a vision for Nevada’s economy — it is an environment in which his expertise, network, and capital would translate into significant personal gain.
For voters weighing Kidd’s campaign, this distinction matters. The Fintech settlement model would create high-paying jobs for engineers and finance professionals and could diversify Nevada’s economy.
It would not directly address the cost-of-living pressures Kidd highlights elsewhere in his campaign and at his listening event.
My Conclusion
Greg Kidd held the listening event to raise awareness of his campaign. The next day, he announced the campaign in the article on This is Reno.
His purpose in running for Nevada’s Congressional District 2 is to push for Fintech legislation that would allow him to open a Fintech operation in Nevada.
If he succeeds, he will be on his way to making his next $Billion. Greg Kidd is like Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, and Michael Milken. $Billionaires doing billionaire things.