(Chuck Muth) – Last January, Dan Burdish of the Pigpen Project sent an email to the Nevada Secretary of State’s (SOS) office asking for guidance on how to handle voters who had moved to another state, as well as having re-registered to vote in their new state.
“We would like to know if there is a process where we can do this through the Nevada Secretary of State’s office for the entire state,” Dan wrote. “We are just trying to clean up the Nevada voter rolls.”
To this day, Dan has yet to get an answer from the SOS. Or the Attorney General’s office which has been advising the SOS on these matters.
In addition, I had personal conversations with Secretary Cisco Aguilar in early August asking for a meeting to get this issue clarified and resolved. He told me he would…but never did.
So we’ve been flying blind and attempting to figure this stuff out on our own.
And after the Secretary’s August 27 memorandum to Nevada’s county clerks directing them to reject our challenges of moved voters, we were left with no choice but to seek the court’s involvement to resolve various unresolved issues because the SOS had chosen not to consult, advise, or work with us.
Naturally, the progressives on the left who do NOT want the voter files cleaned up came out of the woodwork to oppose us and filed all manner of nit-picking technical objections to our lawsuits.
I’ll say this: While some consider these folks “evil,” they ain’t stupid. They’ve been litigating and fighting against cleaning the voter rolls for many, many years and threw everything, INCLUDING the kitchen sink, into their arguments against our effort.
I’ll give you an example…
In order to file a Section 547 challenge, the Secretary of State created a form to fill out that does NOT require the challenge to be notarized. However, the SOS failed to create a similar form for filing Section 535 challenges (we asked for it months ago).
So what we did was create our own form for filing Section 535 challenges using almost the exact same language as the form for filing Section 547 challenges.
But since they weren’t on an “official” form – thanks to the SOS’ failure to create one – the other team argued that we were required to have them notarized and, therefore, our lawsuits should be dismissed.
There are valid arguments for why the forms didn’t have to be notarized, but once we’d get into court, it’d be a crap shoot. Maybe we’d win; maybe we wouldn’t.
Here’s another example of their hair-splitting arguments…
Our challenges said the challenged voters “appeared” to have moved out-of-state based on information in the NCOA database rather than state categorically “he moved.” In my opinion, a distinction without a difference. But once in court…who knows?
And then there’s this whole issue related to the 90-day “blackout” period. We believe the blackout period doesn’t apply to individual challenges, but only to “systematic” list maintenance conducted by the clerks/registrars.
But that question remains unresolved even though it’s been argued in other states all across the country. Maybe we’d win; maybe not.
Now, here’s the thing…
NRS 293.127 dealing with elections states…
“This title must be liberally construed (my emphasis) to the end that: (c)The real will of the electors is not defeated by any informality or by failure substantially to comply with the provisions of this title with respect to the giving of any notice…”
Obviously, we believe we have MORE than substantially complied with the statutes. But that doesn’t mean a judge would see it the same way. Again, in court it would be an expensive crap shoot with the odds already against us.
And as painful as the decision was on Friday morning – in consultation with and under the advice of our attorney, David O’Mara – rather than playing a bad hand against a stacked deck, here’s what we decided to do…
Live to fight another day.
So we’ve withdrawn our lawsuits, especially since the Secretary of State delayed taking action on this issue and there was no way it’d be resolved before people started sending back their mail-in ballots.
But if the other side thinks we’ve given up, they’re sadly mistaken. I’m a dog on a bone with this thing. And as the saying goes, it’s not how many times you get knocked down; it’s how many times you get back up.
So while the Secretary of State’s office has been negligent in creating the proper form for our challenges – and decidedly unhelpful and uncooperative in assisting us in working on this problem – our opponents’ objections, filed in an effort to kill our lawsuits, actually gave us a “roadmap” for how to proceed from here.
In fact, we’ve already implemented a number of changes that address the main objections raised by our opponents. And we’ve already filed hundreds of new challenges under Section 547. (It’ll be interesting to see how the clerks/registrars handle them.)
And we’ll be right back at it again on November 6th, after the election. Because without taking action, these problems won’t go away. And neither will we.
We’ll be fighting for changes in the laws during next year’s legislative session and will have two full years to continue working on this problem before the 2026 general election when all of Nevada’s statewide races – including Secretary of State and Attorney General – will be on the ballot.
So, yeah, I’m disappointed that we didn’t get to press our arguments in court at this time. But it ain’t over ‘til it’s over. And we’re gonna come back in a MUCH stronger position the next time around.
Unless, of course, Secretary Aguilar – if he honestly wants to see the voter rolls cleaned up – changes course and decides to help us help him instead of just blowing us off.
I’m an optimist, but I won’t be holding my breath.
And I’ll leave you with this…
Lucia Frazier is “just” an ordinary citizen who has been fighting these uphill election integrity issues in Georgia for years now. She’s been demonized, ridiculed, and threatened. But she’s not giving up either.
And I was really struck by something profound she said at a recent hearing; that she’s come to realize the Constitution isn’t here to protect us, that we’re here to protect the Constitution.
Amen and onward!
FAMOUS LAST WORDS
“Waiting for perfect is never as smart as making progress.” – Seth Godin
The Pigpen Project is a project of Citizen Outreach Foundation, an IRS-approved 501(c)(3) grassroots organization founded in 1992. Donations are tax-deductible for federal income tax purposes.