Election results have become controversial topics since 2020, when then-President Donald Trump lost to former President Joe Biden. Trump’s claims of voter fraud — despite overwhelming evidence that no widespread fraud took place — have dominated how we as a state and country talk about voting, especially voting by mail.
Mail-in voting is popular in Nevada. During the 2024 election, nearly half of the state’s voters cast their ballots by mail. In 2022, it was a little more than half.
But Trump sees it differently. During a photo op with reporters in the Oval Office last month, Trump said he was planning to sign an order that seeks to end the use of mail-in ballots as well as voting machines.
"Mail-in ballots are corrupt. Mail-in ballots... You can never have a real democracy with mail-in ballots, and we as the Republican Party are gonna do everything possible to get rid of mail-in ballots. We're gonna start with an executive order that's being written right now by the best lawyers in the country to end mail-in ballots because they're corrupt, and you know that we're the only country in the world — I believe I may be wrong — but just about the only country in the world that uses it. The other thing we want to change is the machines."
The president’s concerns are not new, nor are they completely accurate. The United States is not the only country in the world that allows voters to cast a ballot by mail. Iceland, the UK, Germany, Poland, and Greece all give voters the choice to vote in person or by mail.
And according to Nevada Secretary of State Cisco Aguilar, that's not a decision the president can make.
"That's a decision for the state to make," Aguilar told State of Nevada. "At the state level. This is up to the legislature. It's up to the governor to determine what law is in the state of Nevada. Right now, our law says that we can have a universal mail ballot."
Aguilar also stressed that it's his job to ensure that Nevada elections are secure due to the state's signature verification and curing process.
"We were at Clark County last night discussing the security of our mail ballots and the processes we're implementing to ensure those ballots are secure," said Aguilar. "If there is a chance that somebody might take advantage of the system, our systems have built-in checks and balances. For example, if somebody mails in a mail ballot, they decide to show up at a polling location based on the new system we implemented within the last two years, it immediately flags that voter to say this person is attempting to double vote."
However, if residents still feel like there are problems, they can report them to the Secretary of State's office, which releases a quarterly report on its investigations into voter fraud.
"If a Nevada citizen has a concern about the process, they can file an election integrity violation report that goes directly to our investigators," said Aguilar. "Our investigators are gathering the facts, gathering the information to determine the security and safety of that ballot."
Guests: Cisco Aguilar, Nevada Secretary of State
