Over 100,000 Inactive Voters Removed From Clark County Voter Rolls

Republicans and grass roots activists have successfully challenged Clark County, Nevada, to clean their bloated voter rolls after 8,000+ ballots were counted but sent to undeliverable addresses in the 2020 election. The ballots were submitted for investigation to former Secretary of State Barbara Cegavske (R), but no action was taken. Former Clark County Registrar Joe Gloria, who accepted millions from Mark Zuckerberg in 2020, kept 81,000 people on the rolls despite the requirements of state and federal law.

To note, the 2022 U.S. Senate race between Catherine Cortez-Masto (D) and Adam Laxalt (R) was decided by less than 8,000 votes with Cortez-Masto winning the election and awarding Democrats power in the chamber (see below).

Nevada must comply with the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA) of 1993, which requires states to maintain adequate list maintenance procedures and ensure that voters who have moved jurisdictions are identified, moved to inactive status, and ultimately removed. In accordance with the requirements and procedures of the NVRA and NRS 293.530, 102,267 voters were designated as inactive this month, meaning they will not receive an unsolicited mail in ballot.

In a special legislative session during the pandemic, the Democratic majority unilaterally upended and transformed Nevada election laws, ushering in automatic mail ballots to every registered voter and extending ballot tabulation deadlines. Every active voter now receives a mail ballot, unless they opt out. An active voter does not refer to how often someone votes, rather it refers to mail being accepted or undeliverable. If mail is undeliverable after multiple attempts, the voter is designated as inactive, will no longer receive an unsolicited mail ballot, and will have to show an ID to vote in person.

The two largest counties in Nevada, Clark and Washoe, represent 85 percent of registered voters. Both counties have elections administered by Democrat-appointed registrars, rather than elected Clerks.

It is alleged that several Silver State counties have more active registered voters than voting eligible citizens, including Clark County which has implausibly high registration rates that exceed 90 percent.

In an effort to clean up the voter rolls in Clark County, the Republican National Committee (RNC), Trump Campaign, and Nevada GOP (NV GOP) filed a federal lawsuit challenging the adequacy of Nevada’s list maintenance practices. Although the complaint was initially and incorrectly dismissed on procedural grounds, the RNC filed an amended complaint and ultimately prevailed in the case, which led to Clark County’s compliance.

Based on recent registration numbers and Clark County’s compliance to state and federal law, Republicans are now at their lowest voter registration gap to Democrats in decades. There are only approximately 19,000 voters between Democrats and Republicans statewide. In 2020, the gap between Democrats and Republicans statewide was 87,000+ favoring the Democrats.

In addition to Republican efforts, the Public Interest Legal Foundation (PILF) filed two lawsuits, one in Clark and in Washoe, to remove voters registered at commercial addresses and vacant lots. According to state statute, a P.O. box or a business cannot be listed as a home address. Under Nevada law, individuals are required to register to vote where they live.

As The Globe previously reported, PILF published their review of a 2023 report issued by the Secretary of State that provides an accounting of mail ballots from the midterm 2022 election. The raw data shows, according to PILF’s President J. Christian Adams, that “Automatic mail ballots are a disaster and the Nevada numbers prove it.”

According to PILF’s report, 95,556 ballots were sent to an undeliverable or “bad” address and another 8,036 were rejected upon receipt. 2,133 were from registered Democrats; 2,307 were from Republicans; and, 3,596 were from “Other.” Another 1.2 million ballots never came back to officials for counting. In other words, 71.5 percent of mailed ballots were unaccounted for.

In summary of their review, PILF notes: “As states expand mail voting, Nevada’s 2022 midterm elections offer an alarming case study of close results as they relate to rejected, unreturned, and undeliverable ballots. Nevada’s U.S. Senate race was ultimately called four days later on a margin of 7,928 votes, which determined party control for the chamber. A total of 8,036 rejected ballots out of nearly 513,000 returned may not seem significant, but in this context, it is a reasonable question as to what can be done to reduce the failure rates.”

In July, the RNC and NVGOP launched Protect The Vote to help ensure that the laws on the books are followed and that it  is “easy to vote and hard to cheat.” Republicans are requesting volunteers for the 2024 election, and are encouraging volunteers to sign up here and report any election issues to nevada.protectthevote.com.