Clark County Sheriff Joe Lombardo, who is running for governor of Nevada, believes Democrats are preemptively spending money to attack him in his primary race because they believe he is the Republican candidate most capable of unseating incumbent Gov. Steve Sisolak (D) in the general election.

Lombardo, the frontrunning GOP candidate who has been endorsed by former President Donald Trump, told host Matthew Boyle on SiriusXM’s Breitbart News Saturday he has become an early target for Democrats because of his winnability.

“From the very beginning, in the early throes of this campaign when I alluded that I was considering running for governor, that narrative started right away,” Lombardo said.

Lombardo’s comments come after several groups have moved to attack the top cop in Las Vegas ahead of the June 14 primary.

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A PAC called Stronger Nevada, which NBC linked to the Democratic Governors Association (DGA), reserved $2.1 million in television ads and has started running a 30-second anti-Lombardo ad on the airwaves that criticizes Lombardo as “Slick Joe” who is “more worried about his public image than public safety,” per the Nevada Independent.

The outlet noted another group, called the Patriot Freedom Fund, sent out mailers attempting to frame Lombardo as weak on the Second Amendment. The mailers appeared to come from Republicans accusing Lombardo, who has served as sheriff since 2015, of not being conservative enough on gun rights. However, the only registered officer of the group is a real estate agent linked to Democrat Assemblywoman Sandra Jauregui. Jauregui was present during the 2017 mass shooting in Vegas that left 60 dead and has since become an outspoken gun control advocate, though she told the Nevada Independent she was not aware of the mailers.

Lombardo said of the ads, “The sitting governor is currently most worried about my candidacy and my ability to unseat him moving forward to the general, so as a result of that, he’s obviously convinced his players, you know, the Democratic Governors Association among some other PACs, to get involved, to get engaged and do everything they can to malign me and my resume to prevent me from moving forward after the primary.”

A recent poll, taken by the Nevada Independent and OH Predictive Insights, found Lombardo leading the packed GOP gubernatorial primary field by 20 points. Lombardo received 35 percent, attorney Joey Gilbert received 15 percent, and former Sen. Dean Heller received 11 percent. Multiple others received single-digit support.

The same poll, taken in early April, found Lombardo was the strongest of the gubernatorial candidates in a hypothetical matchup against Sisolak. Lombardo trailed Sisolak by nine points in that poll.

A Reno Gazette-Journal/Suffolk poll, also taken in early April, found Lombardo two points ahead of Sisolak.

Democrats are “making a significant investment in [their attack ad] endeavor, so hopefully the voters are savvy enough, the voters understand that,” Lombardo said. “I’m the only candidate on the Republican ticket that can beat Steve Sisolak, and the polls show that. Poll after poll in the last two, three, four months has shown that, that I’m the only one situated in a head-to-head to Sisolak who can unseat him.”

Write to Ashley Oliver at aoliver@breitbart.com. Follow her on Twitter at @asholiver.