The Donald Trump campaign filed a lawsuit Monday against election officials in Clark County, Nevada, which includes Las Vegas, CNN reported.
The Trump campaign is suing Joe P. Gloria, the Clark County registrar of voters, claiming that he kept polling locations open for “two hours beyond the designated closing time,” according to CNN.
Early voting surged in the Las Vegas area, particularly in locations in Latino communities, like a Hispanic grocery store where voters waited in lines for hours, according to reports.
Nevada elections officials deny the Trump campaign’s claims. A Clark County spokesman told CNN that officials only allowed those who arrived at the polling place by the official closing time to vote. He denied that the closing times were extended.
Nevada law says that polling places should be kept open for voters waiting in line by the official closing time.
The lawsuit claims that at four Las Vegas early voting sites, including the Hispanic grocery store Cardenas, voters were allowed to vote on Friday, the last night of early voting, even if they arrived at the location after 8:00 p.m., when early voting official closed by law.
The Trump campaign’s lawsuit is requesting that the early vote ballots cast at the locations in question be kept separate from other ballots while the issue is litigated.
The complaint includes an account by a poll watcher named Ronald Ketcham who said he observed the lead elections worker at the Cardenas market site tell the Democratic observer at around 5:00 p.m. that the polling place would be open for an additional 2 hours after 8.00 p.m. The elections worker also told Ketcham that voters who showed up to other sites after 8:00 were being told to come to Cardenas, according to the complaint. Ketcham said he saw 150-200 voters, if not more jump in the Cardenas line after 8:00 p.m.
Jesse Law, a staffer for the Trump campaign in Nevada, submitted his own affidavit. He said a poll worker at one of the other sites, at Silverado Ranch Plaza, told him Friday at about 8:30 p.m. that those who jumped in line after 8:00 p.m. were still being allowed to vote.
Law then traveled to the Cardenas market, according to his account, where he said he also observed voters who got in line after 8:00 p.m. being allowed to vote.
An attorney named Jeanne Valentine submitted an affidavit that said that a poll watcher at the Deer Springs Town Center told her that he had been informed that site would stay open for as long as voters were in line, even if they arrived after 8:00 p.m. Valentine eventually got on the phone with someone at the Clark County registrars office who told her voters who showed up after 8:00 p.m. would be allowed to vote, according to her account. Another poll watcher observing a voting location on the Las Vegas strip also called Valentine well after 10:00 p.m. and told her that site was still open, Valentine said.
The complaint said that the campaign had photos of the lines that the court could look at if need be, but did not include them in the filing, as to protect the identities of the voters.
Read the complaint, via UC-Irvine School of Law professor Rick Hasen, below:
Trump Nevada Lawsuit by hasenr on Scribd
