RENO, Nev. (AP) — Commissioners in Nevada’s second most populous county certified the results of two local recounts on Tuesday, reversing course on a controversial vote against certification that spurred legal action and put Washoe County in unchartered legal territory.
The 4-1 vote overturns a rare move against certifying election results in the politically mixed swath of Reno and northern Nevada that had potential implications for how the November elections could play out in one of the nation’s most important swing counties.
Nevada Secretary of State Cisco Aguilar and Attorney General Aaron Ford are still waiting for the state Supreme Court to address a petition they filed last week that seeks to confirm the legal obligations of county commissioners to certify election results. While it is unclear if or when the court will take that up, a ruling could set precedent and apply to county commissions statewide who refuse to certify results in November.
Aguilar had said that the circumstances of last week’s vote could set “a dangerous precedent” that undermines the confidence of voters.
Moments before Tuesday’s redo of the vote, the county’s chief deputy district attorney, Mary Kandaras, recommended that the commissioners certify the vote to follow state law.
Once seen as a mundane and ministerial task, election certification has become a pressure point since the 2020 election. During the midterms two years later, a scenario similar to what is unfolding in Washoe County played out in New Mexico after that state’s primary, when a rural county delayed certification of the results and relented only after the secretary of state appealed to the state’s supreme court.
Two Republican Washoe County commissioners, Jeanne Herman and Mike Clark, have consistently voted against certifying results and are supported by the wider far-right movement within the county that promotes election conspiracy theories.
But on Tuesday, Clark apologized to his constituents before changing his vote in favor of certification. He said he made the vote “under extreme duress under the threat of both my position, and prosecution.” Throughout the meeting, he doubled down on his mistrust county’s election tallies, saying the county needs to clean its voter rolls.
Republican Clara Andriola, who the far-right movement had targeted in the primaries, also reversed course on Tuesday. She has often been the swing vote in election votes – rejecting the label of election denier and thanking the county elections department, while alleging that several “hiccups” in the process called for more governmental bodies to look at county elections processes.
Andriola said that since her vote against certification last week, she has met with the interim registrar of voters, which gave her more confidence in how elections are run in Washoe County. She also met with the district attorney’s office, who she said gave her clarity that it is the commission’s duty to certify election results without discretion.
The local far-right movement has been on full display at commission meetings, where conspiracy theories about voting machines and distrust of election administrators have become a mainstay during the commission’s public comment sections and have led to harassment and high turnover in the local election office the past four years.
On Tuesday, most commenters urged the commissioners to not certify the results. Some repeated false claims of stolen elections, broken machines and a “cabal” within the county that alters voting. Others called for a hand recount or a complete redo of the election.
One commenter printed out pictures of city and county employees that she accused of corruption. Several times, commission chair Alexis Hill threatened to go into a recess when public comments were interrupted or delved into calling out individuals, rather than the board itself. A few commenters had urged commissioners to certify the vote.
“Stand your ground, stay the course. You showed backbone last week. Don’t lose it now,” Bruce Parks said before the vote, He is chairman of the Washoe GOP that alleged Joe Biden is the illegitimate winner of the 2020 election.
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