RNC, Nevada GOP lawsuit claims voter roll inconsistencies in Nevada

“Nevada’s impossibly high registration rates, large rates of inactive registered voters, low numbers of removals, and inconsistent enforcement across counties indicate an ongoing, systemic problem with its voter-list maintenance efforts,” the lawsuit says.

Republican voter Scott Johnston was also named as a plaintiff in the lawsuit, which claims that ineligible voters “can and do vote in Nevada’s elections,” and that those illegitimate votes “will dilute” Johnston’s vote, the complaint says. Inaccurate voter rolls also undermine Johnston’s confidence in the integrity of Nevada’s elections, the lawsuit purports.

The national committee uses states’ voter registration lists to develop plans and budgets, and the lists help the RNC estimate the number of staff it needs in a given area, the number of volunteers needed to contact voters, etc. If voter registration lists are not up-to-date, the RNC might misallocate its resources on door-knocking, mailers and other outreach efforts, the lawsuit argues.

Maintaining accurate voter rolls is especially important given Nevada’s automatic mail-ballot system that automatically sends a mail ballot to a voter unless they opt out, the lawsuit says.

“Mailing ballots based on inaccurate registration lists further damages the integrity of Nevada’s elections,” the lawsuit says.

‘Time and resources’

Nevada GOP and the RNC asked the court to find the secretary of state and the other plaintiffs in violation of the National Voter Registration Act and to issue an injunction barring them from violating the act. It also asks the court to order the defendants to develop and implement effective registration list-maintenance programs to ensure that ineligible registrants are not on the voter rolls and to pay for the plaintiff’s expenses relating to the lawsuit.

The lawsuit said the plaintiffs have spent a lot of “time and resources investigating Defendants’ failure to comply with their list-maintenance obligations.”

Nevada’s election administrations has come under a microscope in the last few months, especially after glitches caused by a reported coding error fueled distrust among Nevadans, some of whom have believed the repeatedly disproved claims of election fraud since the 2020 election. Aguilar had apologized for those errors occurring, and reiterated the security of Nevada’s elections.

Michael McDonald, chairman of the Nevada Republican Party, who has promoted unsubstantiated claims that the 2020 election was stolen from Donald Trump, told the Review-Journal that every vote must count, whether it's a Republican, Democrat, Independent or Libertarian.

“The only way that happens is with clean voter rolls,” he said. “This is not a partisan issue. This is about all Nevadans having their voices heard.”

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