Nevada

Election Integrity Nonprofit Files Lawsuits Against Two Nevada Counties to Remove Ineligible Voters – Nevada Globe

Published

1 year ago

September 23, 2024

Election Integrity Nonprofit Files Lawsuits Against Two Nevada Counties to Remove Ineligible Voters – Nevada Globe

On Friday, Citizen Outreach Foundation (COF), sponsor of the Pigpen Project to clean up the voter rolls in Nevada, filed a lawsuit (see below) against the clerk’s offices in two Nevada counties asking the court to instruct them to process challenges of suspected ineligible voters who have moved from the residence where they are registered.

SOS Aguilar meetings with Washoe County interim registrar Cari-Ann Burgess during the PPP (Photo: @CiscoAguilar)

For background, as reported by The Globe:

Since May, the foundation has “filed roughly a dozen “test challenges” in Clark County under a provision of state law known as Section 547 using data from the secretary of state’s office and the U.S. Postal Service’s National Change of Address database. It also compared this information with the “official voter registration records of 15 other states.”
Thirteen of the 17 Nevada counties received the challenges from COF and half of the counties processed them by sending a verification letter to the voter in question. The counties that were non responsive included Clark County, the largest county in the Silver State.
In early August, after the routine maintenance list was published by the NVSOS, the foundation filed another challenge related to voters who have moved out of the state, within the state to a different county, or moved within the county to a different voting district.
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In a conversation with The Globe, Muth confirmed that an additional total of 34,222 challenges of “ineligible, ‘moved’ voters” had been filed in early August. Of that total, approximately 20,000 are in Clark County and an estimated 11,000 challenges were filed in Washoe County.
Due to the lack of response to those challenges, COF then filed a public records request in late August and found that the SOS had intervened by issuing a memo on August 27 to election officials.
The memo from Deputy Secretary of Elections Mark Wlaschin claimed that the “personal knowledge” requirement under Section 535 should be interpreted in exactly the same way as the requirement in Section 547. He further instructed clerks to reject challenges made under the former section by organizations like COF that do not fulfill the latter’s definition of “personal knowledge.”
“It is the opinion of the Secretary of State that such challenges do not meet the requirement of ‘personal knowledge’ of facts supporting the challenge required by NRS 293.535 and 293.547,” Wlaschin wrote. “County clerks who receive these challenges should reject them and instruct challengers that personal knowledge gained through firsthand experience or observation of the facts relating to a voter’s eligibility is necessary to file a valid challenge under either statute.”
Wlaschin admitted that “‘personal knowledge’ is not explicitly defined under [Section 535] or implementing regulations,” yet claimed “the Secretary views the term to mean the same thing in both statutes.”
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Filed by The O’Mara Law Firm on behalf of COF, the Petition for Writ of Mandamus asks the First Judicial Court of the State of Nevada “to compel the Carson City and Storey County Clerks to perform their duties…by requiring the Clerks to notify the registrant of the challenge and take the necessary actions as required under NRS 293.530.”

“This was a last resort action we’ve worked hard to avoid,” said Chuck Muth, president of COF, in a press release. “We’ve done everything by the book and according to the law, but the Clerks got caught between a rock and a hard place. Some had been properly processing our challenges as required by law,” Muth continued, “until Nevada Secretary of State Cisco Aguilar issued a directive in August advising them to reject our challenges based on a bizarre reading of the statute. So we were left with no choice but to seek the court’s intervention,” he concluded.

Muth noted that some Clerks had been working cooperatively with his organization in processing the challenges until Secretary Aguilar’s memo, while others have been hiding behind the directive as an excuse to duck their responsibilities.

This is the first of what COF expects will be multiple lawsuits filed in other counties this week unless they reject the Secretary of State’s opinion and immediately begin processing the duly-filed challenges.

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Nevada

Earthquake swarm rattles central Nevada near Tonopah along newly identified fault

Published

10 hours ago

March 4, 2026

Press Room

Earthquake swarm rattles central Nevada near Tonopah along newly identified fault

A swarm of earthquakes has been rattling a remote stretch of central Nevada near Tonopah, including a magnitude 4.0 quake that hit near Warm Springs Tuesday morning.

Seismologists said the activity is typical for Nevada, where clusters of earthquakes can flare up in a concentrated area. “This is a very Nevada-style earthquake sequence. We have these a lot where we just see an uptick in activity in a certain spot,” said Christie Rowe, director of the Nevada Seismological Lab.

The latest magnitude 4.0 quake struck east of Tonopah near Warm Springs. The largest earthquake in the swarm so far has measured a 4.2.

What has stood out to researchers is the fault involved. Rowe said the earthquakes are occurring along a fault stretching along the southern edge of the Monitor and Antelope ranges — and that it was previously unknown to scientists. “We didn’t know this fault was there. It’s a new fault to us — not to the Earth, obviously — but it was previously unknown,” Rowe said.

For now, the earthquakes have remained moderate. Rowe said the lab would not deploy additional temporary sensors unless activity increases to around a magnitude 5 or greater.

Seismologists said they are continuing to watch the swarm closely as Nevada works to bring the ShakeAlert early warning system to the state. The program, already active in neighboring states, can send cellphone alerts seconds before shaking arrives. “For me, it’s a really high priority. That distance to the faults gives us enough time to warn people — and that can make a big difference in reducing injuries and damage,” Rowe said.

Seismologists encouraged anyone who feels shaking to report it through the U.S. Geological Survey’s “Did You Feel It” system, saying even small quakes can help scientists better understand Nevada’s seismic activity.

Experts said the swarm is worth monitoring but is not cause for alarm. They noted that earthquakes like the 5.8 that hit near Yerington in December 2024 typically happen in Nevada about every eight to 10 years, and said they will continue monitoring the current activity closely.

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Nevada

Kalshi Enforcement Action Belongs in Nevada Court, Judge Says

Published

22 hours ago

March 3, 2026

Press Room

Kalshi Enforcement Action Belongs in Nevada Court, Judge Says

Nevada state court is the proper venue for reviewing whether KalshiEX LLC is improperly accepting sports wagers without a license, a federal district court said.

The Nevada Gaming Control Board showed that the state statutes under which it seeks relief don’t require interpreting federal law, Judge Miranda M. Du of the US District Court for the District of Nevada said in a Monday order. The board’s action is now remanded to the First Judicial District Court in Carson City, Nev., the order said.

The board in 2025 urged Kalshi, a financial services company, to get a gaming license, but the …

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Nevada

EDITORIAL: Nevada still vulnerable as tourist downturn continues

Published

1 day ago

March 3, 2026

Press Room

EDITORIAL: Nevada still vulnerable as tourist downturn continues

Strip gaming executives can put their best spin on the numbers, but local tourism indicators remain a major concern. Casino operators seeking to draw more people through the door still have much work to do.

The Nevada Gaming Control Board released January gaming numbers Friday. The news was underwhelming. The state gaming win was down 6.6 percent from a year earlier. The Strip took the largest hit, an 11 percent drop. But the gloomy returns were spread throughout Clark County: Downtown Las Vegas was off 5.2 percent, Laughlin suffered a 3.3 percent decline and the Boulder Strip dipped by 7 percent.

For the current fiscal year, gaming tax collections are up a paltry
2.1 percent, below budget projections.

The red flags include more than gaming numbers. Recently released figures for 2025 reveal that visitation to Las Vegas fell nearly 8 percent from 2024, which represented the lowest total since the pandemic in 2021. Traffic at Reid International Airport fell more than 10 percent in December and was down 6 percent for the year. Strip occupancy rates fell 3 percent in 2025.

To be fair, this is not just a Las Vegas problem. International travel to the United States was down
4.8 percent in January, Forbes reported, the ninth straight month of decline. Travel from Europe fell 5.2 percent, and passenger counts from Asia fell 7.5 percent. Canadian tourism cratered by 22 percent.

No doubt that President Donald Trump’s blustery rhetoric has played a role in the decline, but there’s more at work. International tourism has been largely flat since Barack Obama’s last few years in office. But domestic travel has held relatively steady although it is “starting to cool,” according to the U.S. Travel Association. Las Vegas hasn’t been helped by high-profile complaints last year about exorbitant Strip prices for parking, bottled water and other staples. Casino operators responded by offering discounts, particularly for locals, and they’ll need to continue those policies into 2026.

The tourism downturn has ramifications for the state budget, which relies primarily on sales and gaming tax revenues to support spending plans. “Nevada’s employment and economic challenges reflect deep structural factors that extend beyond cyclical economic fluctuations,” noted a recent report by economic analyst John Restrepo. “The state’s extreme concentration in tourism and gaming creates unique vulnerabilities.”

The irony is that state and local politicians have been talking for the past half century about “diversifying” the state economy. In recent years, that effort has primarily consisted of handing out millions in tax breaks and other incentives to attract businesses to the state. A dispassionate observer might ask whether that approach has brought an adequate return on investment.

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