If we had ranked choice in the presidential election now, fear of a third party candidate and Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., running a presidential ticket would dissipate. (Getty Images)

Policy, politics and progressive commentary

It’s primary season in Nevada, and once again our state’s complicated mixture of open and closed primaries is on full display. Candidates for city councils are running in nonpartisan open primaries, while races for county commission and state legislature are closed, partisan elections. Caught in the confusion are now the largest group of voters in Nevada, independents, officially called nonpartisans, who are shut out of many of the elections that matter.  

Who are these independent nonpartisan voters? They are a cross-section of society, but some groups stand out. Let’s start with young people, Hispanic voters, and U.S. military veterans.  Over 50% of millennial and GenZ voters-now the largest group of voters by age- are independent. 52% of Hispanic voters are independent. About half of all U.S. military veterans are independent. 

In Nevada, nonpartisans make up 34% of voters, which is more than registered Democrats or registered Republicans. So why, then, are the political parties allowed to block the largest group of voters from casting a ballot in our taxpayer funded elections? Primary elections cost Nevada taxpayers millions to run, yet these taxpayers are not allowed to participate.  Nothing in the U.S. or Nevada constitutions gives the political parties the right to force membership in their private organizations as a prerequisite to vote, yet we allow this to happen. Do we really care about voting rights?

Polls of Nevadans show increasing support for open primaries as the disconnect between the electorate and the parties deepen. This growing divide helps to explain why Nevadans voted yes in 2022 on an initiative to open the primaries for our statewide races.  Nevadans who voted yes affirmed their commitment to letting all voters vote without barriers.

But to let all voters vote, open primary supporters must vote yes one more time this November. There are no other open primary options.  No legislative candidate is talking about sponsoring an open primaries bill for the 2025 legislative session, in fact, there was a bill in 2021 to open our primaries, yet the Democratic majority refused to even give it a hearing. Ballot Question 3 is the only path forward to elections where any candidate can run without party roadblocks, and all eligible voters can decide which candidates move forward to the general election.  

In 2008, in Washington State Grange v. Washington State Republican Party the U.S. Supreme Court established that taxpayer-funded primaries can be used in this way.  The Court ruled that political parties can nominate and endorse candidates outside of the primary process if voters decide to change the primary election’s purpose. 

Yes, Ballot Question 3 includes ranked choice voting in the general election, but it does so to address the danger of vote splitting and to find candidates who have majority support. If we want stronger voting rights by opening our primaries and to allow more candidates to move forward to help those without deep pockets to compete, we must implement a tool for mitigating the spoiler effect.  

Ranked choice voting allows voters to vote their hearts with their first choice, but then go with the majority with their second choice.  If we had this mechanism in the presidential election now, fear of a third party candidate and Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. running a presidential ticket would dissipate. Is ranked choice voting a panacea? No, but as our electorate becomes more ideologically diverse, we need tools that can manage more than two candidate choices without creating a crisis. 

Increasingly, primaries are often the most meaningful elections in Nevada. For example, in the 2022 general election races for the state legislature, only 11% of those races were competitive, so the decisive vote in those races happened in the primary. We simply can no longer accept a status quo that includes winning in a Nevada closed primary after a candidate only courts a small fraction of eligible party voters.  

Ultimately, in the open primary races, candidates are free to reach out to all their constituents, not just the partisan few, and every voter is counted equally and fairly.

Do we know implementing open primaries would make a difference?  Yes, because half our current elections are already open primaries.  In our state’s open primary races it is much harder to “primary” someone or for the political parties to limit who runs. These races are, therefore, much more likely to have multiple candidates which means more choices for voters. In fact, it is not unusual to have ten or more candidates in our mayor and school board races. 

In sum, there are many reasons for opening the rest of our primary races and few reasons that can justify stopping voters from voting. Having half-open and half-closed primaries makes no sense. It’s time to make all our primary races open to all taxpayers who are eligible to vote. Nevadans will most certainly support the only option in November that lets all voters vote.  

The post It’s time to make our primary elections make sense appeared first on Nevada Current.

(Mario Tama/Getty Images)

Policy, politics and progressive commentary

Much has been said and written about voting rights this last year and for good reasons. Vote Nevada, a nonprofit founded by Nevadans for Nevadans, will be contributing to this dialogue over the summer with events focused on our full suite of democracy rights, such as the right to fair representation and the right to engage in direct democracy. Because voting rights do not exist in a vacuum, protecting voting rights alone is insufficient to save our democracy; we must also ensure voters have the right to vote for fair representation through a diverse range of candidates, and to engage in governing activities without frivolous litigation. 

Outside of this package of democracy-affirming constitutional protections, voting rights are easily subjected to manipulation by the political parties, which can mute voters’ voices through gerrymandering, and by limiting who may fully participate in primary and general elections and who may engage in legislative processes. 

These discussions and actions to protect democracy rights are constitutionally established in the First Amendment, obviously, but also in the preamble to the U.S. Constitution and the Declaration of Rights in Nevada’s constitution, which both clearly recognize a role for “we the people” in governance. Of the two founding documents, Nevada’s Declaration is the clearest in establishing where political power originates: “All political power is inherent in the people[.] Government is instituted for the protection, security and benefit of the people; and they have the right to alter or reform the same whenever the public good may require it.” Article 1, Sec. 2

Vote Nevada, therefore, strongly argues that to fully protect voting rights, we first must recognize and respect the individual constitutional right to directly reform government. The clearest historical example of this reform impulse occurred approximately 100 years ago when reformers added the initiative, referendum and recall to many state constitutions, including Nevada’s, and when Americans added the 16th, 17th and 19th amendments to the U.S. Constitution. These reforms derived from the fight to curb Gilded Age corruption and included the assertion that “the people” could effectively reform government if given an enhanced right to vote.

So, while our legislature did protect voting rights, there was no hearing on SJR9, a proposal from state Sen. Ben Kieckhefer (R-Reno) to amend the state constitution to create an independent redistricting commission, and no discussion of redistricting processes, and there was no hearing on SB121 to discuss reforming our primary elections. The public was therefore denied its right to even question the bills’ sponsor let alone engage in a debate on the merits of the bills. Stopping a discussion of fair representation, legal redistricting, and electing candidates to office, fails to respect the people’s political rights and so fails to fully protect voting rights.  

Fair representation starts with fair redistricting processes. The U.S. Constitution stipulates that a census count must happen every 10 years of all persons in the country and from this data Americans are then entitled to representation in government. The census process appears very near the beginning of the Constitution, and is reinforced in the 14th amendment, because, for the country’s founders and for the architects of Reconstruction, it was vital to establish that Americans would, indeed, have fair representation. Plainly stated, taxation with representation and equal protection under the law both require fair representation. Redistricting should affirm these rights. 

Nevada’s redistricting maps belong to the people for us to uphold those rights. Consequently, we need transparent and accessible redistricting processes that ensure the people have a seat at the table and that follow all federal laws and Supreme Court rulings.

Our legislative majority approved an additional interim committee to review and make recommendations for the upcoming redistricting processes, so Nevadans must make our voices heard on fair representation through this committee. Vote Nevada will run training sessions this summer to teach anyone interested how to use the redistricting software, which will allow us to check the redistricting maps before the governor signs. 

A right to fair representation also gives voters the right to elect someone who reflects their community’s interests. During the legislative session, the new voting laws and associated rhetoric stressed that every eligible voter should be able to vote, yet nothing was said about the fact that we still elect candidates to office in closed primaries. This practice does not align with fair representation, and it does not empower voters. In fact, it does the exact opposite. Publicly financed elections that select nominees and elect candidates to office that exclude nonpartisan voters silences their voices. 

The constitutional right to vote is not qualified by a partisan restriction. So, shutting out nonpartisan voters from having a say in who is elected due to party affiliation is literally voter suppression. 

Furthermore, our state constitution establishes a right to run ballot questions and a right to vote on ballot questions. Yet, elected officials often say that we should not legislate from the ballot box; that is not what Nevadans stipulated when they amended our state constitution to establish the right to direct democracy through the ballot box. Nevadans over 100 years ago amended direct democracy rights into our state constitution and intended those rights to exist on par with all other constitutional rights. 

Because voting rights do not exist in a vacuum, Vote Nevada is hosting a series of Zoom events this summer to review the rights and powers Nevadans have to ensure fair representation and to engage directly in governing processes. We do have constitutional options for engaging in our redistricting processes and for achieving outcomes that were not advanced during the legislative session and we plan to help Nevadans understand those options.

The post Voting rights alone will not save us  appeared first on Nevada Current.

Not "we the parties." Pixy.org.CC BY-NC-ND 4.0

Policy, politics and progressive commentary

The first three words of the U.S. Constitution are “We the People,” while the words “political party” are absent in the document. Yet, by 1812, elected officials were actively shifting power from the people to the political parties through redistricting. And since 1812, every ten years, the parties continue to decide which voters will matter through the people’s maps. Enough. It is long past time to tap into our constitutional roots and to recenter the people in our governing processes. This should not be a controversial idea in an election cycle filled with calls to make every vote matter and every voice heard; chants in favor of redistricting reform should not be conspicuously silent when gerrymandering suppresses the voices of voters, too. 

Last year a coalition formed to exercise a right to direct democracy established in Nevada’s constitution by running a ballot question to create a redistricting commission. The Fair Maps Nevada coalition worked with Nevadans across the political spectrum who agreed that fair redistricting centers the people, not the political parties, in our democratic republic. Unfortunately, while Nevada instituted many new processes to protect representative democracy when the pandemic hit, no new processes were offered to protect our right to engage in direct democracy. So, our ballot question failed because the only method available to gather signatures would have potentially exposed petition signers to the virus. 

Fortunately, Sen. Ben Kieckhefer is running our redistricting reform ballot question as a Senate Joint Resolution in the 2021 legislative session. Through this assistance we are gaining an opportunity to debate the merits of our proposed amendment, but only if we are not silenced again. It is one thing to disagree with someone, it is something else to silence your opponent. A committee hearing provides us the ability to be heard under equitable conditions.

Briefly, our amendment is short and to the point.  We argue that our current legislative processes, which includes a mandate to complete all the state’s business in 120 days and the power to suspend the Open Meeting Law, does not center We the People in redistricting. Instead, this arrangement is ripe for centering one political party over the other.  Our amendment, therefore, makes redistricting independent of a legislative process that lacks the time and transparency required to ensure constitutional outcomes. 

Second, Nevada’s strict single-subject rule forces amendments to be as uncomplicated as possible. So, we opted to replicate the checks and balances mechanism found in many of our governing systems. None of us assumed it would be possible to remove partisan factions from the redistricting process, so instead, we included three political categories of redistricting commissioners and set them up as balancing powers. 

The amendment tasks the majority and minority leaders in the state Senate and Assembly to each pick one person for the redistricting commission. This translates into two Democrats and two Republicans and all that goes into picking those commissioners. Instead of creating an application process, which could discriminate against categories of applicants, we built in knowledge that the Democratic base will expect diverse commissioners and the Republican base will demand equal rural representation. These four commissioners will then select three commissioners who are registered non-partisan or with a non-major party.  Currently, non-partisan and independent affiliated voters comprise almost 30 percent of our voting population, yet they lack a role in our redistricting process. 

Under our amendment, the redistricting process must proceed in the open with the public empowered to not just fact-check commission maps, but to also submit maps using the same census data as the commission. The commission will be constitutionally required to follow all federal laws and court rulings to produce fair maps, which is not required right now. And lastly, the final redistricting maps must include a ‘yes’ vote from at least one nonpartisan/independent commissioner to become our official maps.  

If, after our amendment passes, the political parties would like to include an application process for placing Nevadans on the commission, that is legislatively possible, but it will add an extra layer of process and procedure. 

We are only asking for an ability to make the case for redistricting reform that will once again center We the People. This should not be so controversial coming out of an election cycle full of calls to ensure every vote counts and every voice matters. Thank you, Sen. Kieckhefer for giving us this opportunity to be heard. 

The post Another chance to curb the partisanship in redistricting appeared first on Nevada Current.

A 2020 Clark County sample ballot included a two-page spread of races for judge.

Policy, politics and progressive commentary

Our recent election was unique in many ways, one of which was the high number of judicial candidates. This was the first election cycle under a new rule to run all district court positions simultaneously to ensure the district judges are paid equitably, but this fix created a burden on voters. As a League of Women Voters president, I hosted Judicial Candidates Open Houses via Zoom each Friday evening between the end of August and the end of October to help voters feel more empowered. During each meeting we discussed judicial processes and the roles of different types of judges.

As the election wound down, we also discussed the judicial election process, both pros and cons.  While all enjoyed meeting with community members, even virtually, there was dissatisfaction with some aspects of the experience.

Candidates were uncomfortable raising campaign funds. Each of us assumes we will never be in court, but because almost every aspect of life includes some type of legal process, every campaign contributor could be a future plaintiff or defendant. But I heard that the real problem with campaign contributions is the appearance of a conflict of interest when a law firm, corporation, attorney, or wealthy individual contributes to a potential judge who could hear cases related to the contributor’s vested interests.

The endorsement process elicited the most distressed responses when we discussed cons.  Based on what I heard, some groups and organizations managed endorsement and evaluation processes transparently, while others were opaque and lacked justifications for endorsements. At this point, we also discussed candidates who lacked an opponent and so did not engage in voter outreach. Some wondered, if voters prefer electing over appointing judges, how the high number of unopposed races facilitated voters vetting those candidates.

When looking for fixes, we must be mindful that Nevada voters have repeatedly rejected moving to even an appointment/retention vote judicial selection process, arguing with their voices and votes that community members should vet judicial candidates directly through elections. This fact along with many voters voting to put more women and candidates from the public defenders’ office on the bench made Clark County District Attorney Steve Wolfson’s recent public call to move to an appointment/retention vote process for putting judges on the bench seem out of touch at best.

Under the circumstances, to cast doubt on the election outcomes made the District Attorney’s motives appear to be a negative reaction to women and/or public defenders winning. This narrative now makes it harder to develop reforms to help voters not feel so overwhelmed. Voters, who were more likely to contact me for help evaluating the judicial candidates than any other office, deserve some relief.

Most voters have methods for casting votes for candidates in other races based on one or two variables, but, because judicial candidates run as nonpartisan, for good reason, the usual R and D marker next to the candidates’ names is missing. So, voters must look for additional assistance. Voter guides and endorsement sheets, therefore, take on more importance in these races. This was certainly the case this year with so many candidates on the ballot, yet, as I previously mentioned, those resources were uneven in quality.

We need a forum for vetting possible changes to our judicial election system that will maintain voting for candidates, are fair to all candidates, and that will assist voters.  Reliable sources of information about all judicial candidates regardless of whether a race draws more than one applicant must be available.

Nevada has a commission that vets candidates for appointment to the bench when a seat opens in-between elections, so would this body be suitable for also compiling a profile for each candidate before the primary election? Or could we create a judicial evaluation board that evaluates sitting judges and then have a review commission that develops profiles for candidates challenging an incumbent? Are there options that do not require a law or a constitutional amendment? If yes, who should spearhead those changes?

Some are asking to allow judicial candidates to run as partisans, but do we really want to inject more partisan rancor into an election process? Unlike other candidates, judicial candidates do not run on a platform or a predetermined set of issues. Judicial candidates are suitable or not based on their knowledge of the law and judicial procedures, so putting a D or R next to a name would provide no indication of these qualifications.

Voter guides and endorsement processes could include more information about how the courts work but relying on private organizations to provide a needed public service could easily lead to hit and miss solutions. One election cycle could include sufficient sound information about the courts, but then the next cycle could be a bust.

What is clear for me, however, is that we need one or more solutions to help voters not feel so overwhelmed.

The post Voters were overwhelmed: What to do about judicial elections appeared first on Nevada Current.

An anti-gerrymandering protest in Washington, D.C. in October, 2017. (Photo: Olivier Douliery, Getty Images)

Policy, politics and progressive commentary

In June of 2019 the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Rucho v. Common Cause that federal courts will no longer accept partisan gerrymandering cases.  Chief Justice Roberts wrote for the majority that partisan gerrymandering is a political issue that must be resolved at the state level.  In response, the League of Women Voters U.S. launched a People Powered Fair Maps plan to create barriers to partisan gerrymandering in each state. 

The League of Women Voters of Nevada adopted the plan and reached out to our democracy partners to form the Fair Maps Nevada coalition.  On November 4, 2019, Fair Maps Nevada filed a constitutional amendment ballot initiative to create an independent redistricting commission. Nevada’s constitution protects the right to circulate a ballot initiative as well as the right to vote on ballot questions. 

On November 27, 2019, Mr. Kevin Benson, a Carson City attorney, filed a lawsuit challenging the ballot question’s summary of effect for a “progressive Democrat.”  His client argued that the summary of the amendment that appears on each signature sheet was misleading.  Fair Maps Nevada offered to edit the summary to clarify the amendment’s intent, but Mr. Benson refused.  The Judge James Russell ultimately agreed with Mr. Benson’s client and asked both parties to submit new versions of the summary to address the plaintiff’s complaints.  Fair Maps Nevada submitted a new summary, but Mr. Benson did not.  Instead, he argued that the whole amendment was misleading and so should be blocked completely from moving forward. 

Essentially, Mr. Benson was asking Judge Russell to deny the Fair Maps Nevada coalition our constitutionally protected right to circulate a petition.  Judge Russell accepted Fair Maps Nevada’s new summary of the amendment and closed the case. 

According to Nevada Revised Statutes there are two causes for filing a complaint against a ballot petition, a challenge to the summary of effect or a claim that the amendment addresses more than one subject.  And NRS states that once a summary of effect is amended it cannot be challenged again. So, Fair Maps Nevada viewed the closing of the case as a green light, filed the revised description of effect with the secretary of state’s office, and began gathering the 97,598 signatures needed to qualify for the November ballot. 

On February 12, 2020, Mr. Benson filed an appeal with the Nevada Supreme Court as the prevailing party in the lower court.  He filed an appeal to complain about his client winning.  Mr. Benson claimed that Judge Russell lacked authority to rewrite our summary and that he was derelict in not providing an analysis of our amendment.  Mr. Benson provided no reference to a statute restricting judges from re-writing a description of effect without the plaintiff’s permission, nor did he provide any evidence that the Fair Maps Nevada amendment violates any laws or causes any actionable harm. 

Fair Maps Nevada asked that the appeal be dismissed, but the Nevada Supreme Court allowed the case to go forward with briefings. 

For context, the initiative, referendum, and recall all date to the Progressive Reform Movement from just over one-hundred years ago, which formed in response to Gilded Age corruption.  Progressive reformers believed empowered voters would hold corrupt political bosses directly accountable, negating the need for reams and reams of laws and regulations.  Ultimately, creating the ability to vote directly on laws and to remove elected officials before a regular election directly enabled voters to stop bad actors. 

By March 2020, it was clear to our coalition that someone else was funding Mr. Benson’s attack against Fair Maps Nevada’s constitutionally protected right to root out corruption in a system.  The listed plaintiff had not uttered or written even one word explaining his arguments against Fair Maps Nevada redistricting reform amendment.  The only conclusion for us was that this litigious harassment was meant to run out the signature gathering clock and drain our funds to keep us from even having a discussion with voters about putting up barriers to gerrymandering.

Democrats have a national organization devoted to eliminating gerrymandering and in red states they curse the practices as a threat to real democracy.  But, apparently, in blue states gerrymandering is right to be guarded by any means necessary, including harassing the League of Women Voters.  

But even more is at stake than one ballot initiative. The Nevada Supreme Court just ruled against the appeal, writing Mr. Benson “presented no authority that actually supports his positions” protesting the description of effect.  The court failed to acknowledge, however, that Nevada Revised Statutes clearly states if a “description is amended in compliance with the order of the court, the amended description may not be challenged” (NRS 295.061). Because the ruling merely evaluates the merits of the arguments, the case resolution leaves the door open for anti-democratic appeals to happen again and again until the right to circulate a ballot petition effectively disappears.  

Every ballot petition circulator who attempts to reign in corruption will draw a description of effect challenge, which will result in a refusal to comply with an order to re-write the summary, and then a Nevada Supreme Court appeal that will block the ballot petition from moving forward. 

It is deeply hypocritical for a party that devotes endless energy to accusing others of suppressing the right to engage in representative democracy to be aggressively engaged in litigation that could destroy the main pillar of direct democracy.  

Furthermore, when I conduct voter registration drives, eligible voters frequently tell me they see no point in voting because both sides are corrupt.  Well, this type of duplicitous, dirty politics aligns perfectly with that narrative and doubles down on that perception.  That’s voter suppression too, the people are tired of it, and it needs to stop.

The post Apparently some Democrats think gerrymandering is fine in blue states appeared first on Nevada Current.

(Photo: Hugh Jackson/Nevada Current)

Policy, politics and progressive commentary

This year voters will consider whether to make voter registration automatic for eligible citizens at the Department of Motor Vehicles, a change that will improve access to the ballot box while protecting the accuracy and integrity of our voter rolls. Automatic Voter Registration, on the ballot as Question 5 and endorsed by the League of Women Voters of Nevada, would improve accessibility, accuracy, and security by modernizing the system.

Today, there are several ways to register to vote in Nevada, including filling out an online application or visiting an Elections Department office in person, but one of the most common is to use a clipboard-and-paper based application form. Political parties and advocacy groups often use the paper-based applications to register new voters. While that’s a worthy aim, it’s far from foolproof. Sloppy handwriting or other human error can lead to redundant or inaccurate voter rolls.

Automatic voter registration offers a better solution than all those paper registration forms.

First, security. Whenever you go to the department of motor vehicles to get a new license or change your address you’ll be automatically registered to vote unless you simply decline to register. When you get a driver’s license or state ID at the DMV, you’re required to show proof of identity and citizenship to trained staff.  Next, the system will automatically verify that you’re a citizen who’s eligible to vote, before forwarding your registration to the Secretary of State’s office. This adds layers of verification that don’t exist when registering to vote with a volunteer with a clipboard.

People who aren’t eligible will be blocked from getting on the rolls automatically. And thanks to the combination of automated systems and trained staff, the chance for the type of human error that was possible with paper registration forms will be vastly reduced, making our system more accurate and secure.

Because the process is automatic, this simple change will help busy working parents, rural voter who live miles from the polls, or servicemembers moving from military post to post. Whenever you update your ID, your voter registration will follow suit automatically. That’s the convenience and accessibility part.

We have already seen Automatic Voter Registration work in other states, making registering simpler and more secure. Fourteen states now have automatic registration and they have saved taxpayer money and reduced registration errors. In Oregon, 250,000 new voters registered, the state still saved money, and non-partisan election experts agree the change lowered the number of ineligible people added to the voter rolls. And we’ve seen this work in red states and blue states, from Alaska and Colorado to Massachusetts and Maryland.

To improve trust in our voting system and ensure our voter rolls are accurate, we need to make the process of registering both convenient and secure. That’s why the League of Women Voters of Nevada has endorsed this initiative. That’s also why, when I cast my ballot in November, I’ll be voting for Question 5 – Automatic Voter Registration – and it’s why I hope you will, too.

The post Guest op-ed: Making voter registration simpler and more secure appeared first on Nevada Current.