Trump Campaign, GOP Hosts ‘Protect The Vote’ Tour And Election Integrity Training for Nevadans

Last week, the RNC, Team Trump, and the NV GOP hosted a “Protect the Vote” Tour and Election Integrity volunteer training in Reno. The event solicited grassroots supporters and highlighted election integrity efforts, with a “strong emphasis on ensuring that Silver State elections are fair, accurate, secure, and transparent.”

Thank you to @MattWhitaker46 and @McDonaldNV for a fabulous @RNCVoteProtect event in the Biggest Little City!

Reno is fired up and has an army of poll watchers and poll workers ready to ensure elections are clean, fair, and transparent!

🇺🇸https://t.co/wWEeJ81AbK🇺🇸 pic.twitter.com/geyXQFGQ9R

— Alida Ceballos (@AlidaC_NV) September 3, 2024

In a released statement from the RNC, the Protect the Vote tour and program “champions election integrity, rallies voters for President Trump, and trains volunteers to ensure it is easy to vote and hard to cheat this November.” The program is operating in the battleground states and is supported by poll watchers, poll workers and lawyers. Any issues are reported immediately to a statewide hotline and the NV GOP, RNC, and the Trump campaign will provide “rapid response to ensure that every legal vote is counted and election interference is stopped.”

In an editorial featured in The Globe, NV GOP Chairman Michael McDonald stated, “Democratic Governor Steve Sisolak and legislators in Carson City passed AB 321, a bill that radically changed Nevada’s election law by mandating that every voter on the active voter registration list be sent a mail-in ballot. Although this law has clear guidelines for accepting mail-in ballots post- election, Nevada officials have routinely accepted ballots, up to four days after Election Day, without any postmark at all. This blatant violation of Nevada law undermines election security, as there is no way to determine when these ballots were mailed, posing a significant risk of fraud and illegal ballot counting. The RNC has been hard at work on the legal front to address these violations and uphold the integrity of our election process.”

The RNC’s Election Integrity Department has led several ongoing election integrity lawsuits in Nevada. During the last legislative session, Deputy Secretary of State for Elections Mark Wlaschin testified that non-postmarked ballots received after Election Day are counted in Nevada. In one the lawsuits, the RNC alleges that there is a significant risk of potential fraud and maintains that the counting of ballots without postmarks violates state law. In July, Chief U.S. District Court Judge Miranda Du dismissed the case on the grounds that the plaintiffs did not have standing to file the lawsuit. The RNC has appealed her decision.

In March, the RNC and the Nevada GOP filed a lawsuit alleging five Nevada counties are violating the National Voting Rights Act (NVRA) by not maintaining clean and accurate voter rolls. Judge Christina Silva also determined the plaintiff’s did not have standing, but fell short of dismissing the complaint. The RNC has vowed to “use every legal avenue to fight the decision.”

As Nevada is a battleground state, elections often come down to the margins. The two largest counties in Nevada, Clark and Washoe, represent 85 percent of registered voters.

According to data (see below) from the Secretary of State’s office, more than 45,000 mail ballots were counted after Election Day in 2022 in Clark and Washoe counties, representing about six percent of Clark County ballots and three percent of Washoe county ballots.

In the 2022 race for control of the U.S. Senate, Senator Catherine Cortez Masto defeated GOP challenger Adam Laxalt by less than 8,000 votes. In the 2020 election, which implemented universal mail balloting during the pandemic, Vice President Joe Biden defeated former President Donald Trump by 33,596 votes (2.4 percent). In that election, over 8,000 ballots were counted but sent to undeliverable addresses.