UPDATE: The Washoe County Registrar of Voters Office says as of June 10th, the county had received 95,375 ballots, accounting for a 32.6% turnout the day before.
Officials results won't be known until June 19th, but earlier, The Associated Press announced that -
Mark Amodei easily defeated two challengers to win a Republican primary for a U.S. House seat in northern Nevada.
Amodei has represented Reno and northern Nevada since 2011 and faced relatively unknown challengers Joel Beck and Jesse Hurley in Tuesday’s election.
Amodei in 2018 handily defeated a more well-known tea party favorite, Sharron Angle in the Republican primary and went on to win re-election in the GOP-heavy 2nd Congressional District.
Democrats have been making gains among registered voters in the district, including in the Reno-area, but they’re not expected to overcome the Republican advantage among voters.
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Democrat Dina Titus has won a primary election in Nevada’s 1st Congressional District.
Titus easily defeated Allen Rheinhart and Anthony Thomas in Tuesday’s election, according to results released early Wednesday.
She’s represented central Las Vegas and the casino-lined Las Vegas Strip in Congress since 2012.
The former state senator and university professor is expected to handily win re-election in November.
Democrats make up 49% of voters in the district while Republicans make up about 21%.
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Susie Lee has defeated two Democratic challengers as she seeks re-election to her U.S. House seat.
Results early Wednesday show the freshman congresswoman overcame challenges in Tuesday’s election from Dennis Sullivan and Tiffany Ann Watson for her seat in Nevada’s 3rd Congressional District.
The district includes southwest Las Vegas, Henderson and Boulder City and extends to the state lines with California and Arizona.
It’s expected to be the closest election battle in November. Lee won the swing district by 9% points in 2018 but President Donald Trump defeated Democrat Hillary Clinton there in 2016.
To view Nevada's first results, click here.
Nevada State Democratic Party Chair William McCurdy II released the following statement in response to reports of up to six-hour wait times and Nevadans voting late into the evening in the primary election:
“The disaster that was hours-long wait times and Nevadans voting well past midnight on election night are the exact problems we worked to avoid. These problems were entirely avoidable by the Secretary of State. They are the consequences of inadequate polling locations across the state. If not for the intervention of NV Dems and our partner groups to increase the number of in-person locations beyond just one in Clark County--which was the minimum required by the Secretary of State--these problems undoubtedly would have been exacerbated. The Secretary of State must ensure the state will do better in November.”
Original Story: Thousands of Nevadans lined up to place their votes in the primary election, Tuesday. By 4:00, 800 people voted in-person at the Washoe County Registrar's Office. The line stretched about two blocks and some waited one hour to vote.
"By voting, it gives my right to elect people in our government that will make changes," Bill Gritter, Reno resident said.
Tuesday is also the deadline for voters to mail their ballots. Unlike other elections, there will be limited in-person voting. Each county has at least one polling location. Washoe County's polling place is at the registrar's office. Washoe County sent out 292,000 mail-in ballots. More than 72,000 had voted, midway through election day. The 25 percent voter turnout is expected to grow with 15,000 mail-in ballots expected Tuesday, alone.
"I think it's fabulous," Susan Hoodie, Sparks resident said. "So often, people don't vote so it's good to see people out voting. I think it's terrific."
The overwhelming majority of voters mailed in their ballots. Others say they wanted to vote in-person on election day.
"It's important to me to vote and I just didn't like the idea of allowing anything between me and actually casting my vote," Daniel Gomez, Reno resident said.
"I've always voted in-person," Warren Gilbert, Reno resident said. "I've never done mail-in voting. I think it's more personal. I like that experience."
Others filled out their paper ballots but decided to return it to the registrar in-person.
"I still like placing that vote and getting it in the hands of the registrar, where it needs to be," Willis Jones, Stead Resident said.
Voters still have time to fill out their mail-in ballots, as long as they are postmarked by June 9 and arrive at the registrar's office by June 16, they will count. People who want to vote, in-person have until 7:00 p.m. to get in line. Voters do have to follow guidelines regarding COVID-19.
"Remember that you will need to wear a mask and your temperature will be taken at the door," Spikula said. "We also have a sanitizing process."
Staff and volunteers will also follow guidelines. Spikula says one of the challenges of this election is finding the proper PPE for staff.
"Protective equipment for our staff and our poll workers and making sure that we have enough to accommodate in-person voting and the procedures for sanitizing and going through that process at our polling location," Spikula said. "Everyone in our office is wearing face masks and gloves when they're opening and handling ballots, so it's different."
Each piece of voting equipment, including the machines, pencils and cards are sanitized between each voter, which could slow down the process. Spikula says it is hard to estimate how many people will vote in-person.
"We're not sure what the volume is going to be, tomorrow, but we're prepared to be able to expand if we have to to accommodate as many voters as we possibly can at a time," Spikula said.
Washoe County will release election results as soon as all of the state's polls close. They will not be official results because they will only include votes from before or on election day.
"Those are going to be unofficial and they're going to change between that time period and June 16 because we will still be accepting mail-in ballots," Spikula said.
A typical election will have voting locations spread throughout each county. That is not the case for this primary election, since most people are voting through mail-in ballots. Spikula says Washoe County has adjusted but that the methods of voting are familiar but resources are used in different areas.
"We've done mail-in ballots and absentees for a long time, so we know how to do it," Spikula said. "It was just accommodating to the increase in volume and organization."
Spikula says there have been about 1,200 errors on ballots, countywide. Most of those are because there is no signature or the signature does not match. She says other mistakes include households with multiple voters who mix their ballots up.
"We do signature verification and if a signature is missing or doesn't match, we reach out to that voter to get that information so that we can process their ballot," Spikula said.
Nevada is among five states holding a primary election - the others are Georgia, North Dakota, South Carolina and West Virginia.
For a list of voting locations in Nevada, follow this link here.
Associated Press reports long lines of three hours or more at Las Vegas-area polling places may delay release of primary election results Tuesday.
Nevada State Democratic Party Chair William McCurdy II released the following statement in response to long wait times:
“As predicted, despite the Secretary of State moving Nevada’s primary to an all-mail election, many Nevada voters still participated in person. Hours-long wait times to cast a vote is exactly why NV Dems and our partner groups sued the state to improve voting by mail, allow for voter assistance, and expand the number of in-person polling locations. Had the Secretary of State gotten her way and Clark County voters were limited to just a single polling location, these wait times would have been even longer than the ones we’re seeing now. It is imperative the state offer an adequate amount of hygienic, well-organized polling locations and we will continue fighting for these improvements to prevent a repeat in November should we find ourselves under the same circumstances.”
