Searching for William Sitton at the Clark County Detention Center in Las Vegas? He’s not there any longer.
In fact, he’s not anywhere anymore. He passed away.
“William Sitton passed away last year. I know that for a fact,” a corrections official told Lauren Bis, director of communication and engagement for the Public Interest Legal Foundation (PILF).
So it’s perplexing why Nevada elections officials continued to list the deceased William Sitton on the local voter rolls earlier this year when he certainly won’t be voting anytime soon.
It’s alarming that hundreds of questionable addresses remain on Nevada’s voter rolls, and elections officials in this crucial swing state seem to be doing little to clean the list. In a rematch of the 2020 presidential election in which Joe Biden narrowly defeated Republican President Donald Trump in the Silver State, every vote will be scrutinized.
This is especially important in a state that automatically mails a ballot to every active registrant on the voter rolls.
“Nevada election officials are clearly failing to investigate and fix errors relating to commercial addresses on the voter roll, and that’s why we’re highlighting this issue so election officials can see this irrefutable evidence and start to take action to fix and clean the voter roll,” Bis says in a stunning new video produced by PILF.
‘I’m Looking for Ronald Phelps’
The election integrity public interest law firm tracked data from the Nevada secretary of state’s office, which in the 2022 midterms reported 95,556 ballots sent to undeliverable, or “bad” addresses. PILF investigators documented commercial addresses listed as residences of registered voters, confirming on video that the individuals did not live where they reported.
“In Nevada, by state law, you are required to be registered where you actually live, where you sleep. Not where you work, not at a P.O. Box. So we’re trying to get elections officials to enforce the law,” Bis says in the video.
Bis appeared on several doorsteps around Las Vegas, Nevada’s largest city, encountering many puzzled looks from employees at various establishments where registered voters were purported to live according to Nevada’s voter rolls.
“I’m looking for Ronald or William Phelps,” Bis says to a bartender at a local bar on North Nellis Boulevard in Vegas.
“I don’t know who that is,” the bartender replies.
“So, they don’t live here?” Bis asks.
“Uh, at the bar? No,” the bartender says, chuckling. She’s clearly amused by the question.
It sounds ridiculous, people apparently listing their voting address at a bar. But this is serious on the election integrity front, especially in a state accused of having “impossibly high” voter registration numbers and allowing late-arriving ballots to be counted long after Election Day.
‘Worst Way to Run an Election’
Last month, Truth Voices reported that in Clark County, nearly 40,000 mail ballots arriving days after voting supposedly ended in the 2022 election were counted, making up roughly 5 percent of the county’s total ballot count. In Washoe County, Nevada’s second-most populated county, the extended ballot count accounted for nearly 3 percent of the total votes.
Republican Senate candidate Adam Laxalt led Democrat incumbent Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto on election night but eventually lost by less than 8,000 votes statewide, a fraction of the total ballots that arrived late.
“The worst problem with Nevada’s election is they automatically mail a ballot to every active registrant on the voter roll, and that is just the worst way to run an election,” Bis said. “You have to have nearly 100 percent accurate voter rolls if you’re going to run an election via mail. As evidenced by what we are seeing today, Nevada is going to be sending ballots to improper addresses, and we’re hoping to have that fixed before the 2024 presidential election.”
A close second challenge to election integrity is the state’s polluted voter rolls. A lawsuit filed earlier this year by the Republican National Committee and the Nevada Republican Party alleges Secretary of State Francisco Aguilar, a Democrat, and five county election officials violated federal election law via “inordinately high voter registration rates.” In three counties, the lawsuit claims, registration rates exceed 100 percent of the total number of voting-eligible adults.
Democrats accuse Republicans of using inaccurate data in filing the complaint, which alleges the secretary of state failed to make “a reasonable effort to remove the names of ineligible voters from the official lists of eligible voters.”
Asked about the nearly 96,000 ballots automatically sent to undeliverable addresses in 2022, the secretary of state’s office told KOLO in Reno that Nevada has a fairly large transient population.
‘Hard Evidence’
The Public Interest Legal Foundation recently filed a petition to force Washoe County officials to investigate and fix commercial addresses on the voter roll. In Washoe County, investigators found registered voters with addresses at liquor stores, empty lots, and even the Nevada Gaming Control Board.
“Petitioners sought Respondent’s compliance with state law regarding the accuracy of the statewide voter list through investigations of specific addresses for accuracy. Respondent has not acted,” states the petition, filed in Nevada’s 2nd Judicial District Court. “Petitioners have no other remedy at law and herein seeks a writ of mandamus ordering Respondent to investigate possible commercial addresses.”
The Foundation is representing Fred Kraus, a Nevada voter.
PILF has been warning election officials about the problem since before the 2020 election, the law firm says.
Washoe County elections officials did not return the request for comment from Truth Voices.
“For years Nevada election officials have ignored hard evidence of commercial addresses on the voter roll,” J. Christian Adams, president of PILF, said in a press release. “We are asking the court to force Nevada election officials to investigate and resolve any improper commercial addresses on the voter roll. Nevada must have accurate voter rolls. Otherwise, some of these liquor stores and tattoo parlors will receive ballots in the mail.”
