150k Nevada voters may soon be set to ‘inactive’ status, SOS announces

By April Corbin Girnus

Nevada Current

Nevada counties have mailed notices to nearly 157,000 people warning them their voter registration is scheduled to be set to inactive unless they take action, the secretary of state’s office announced Tuesday.

The effort is part of routine voter roll maintenance, the process of which is set in Nevada Revised Statute and federal law through the National Voter Registration Act. A total of 156,996 NVRA notices were sent by Nevada’s 17 counties, according to the secretary of state’s office. That’s equivalent to around 7.8 percent of all active voters statewide.

Voters who receive the notice must return the included postcard by Aug. 6 or they will be considered inactive voters. Inactive voters will not automatically receive a mail ballot for this year’s general election, though they are still eligible to vote.

Nevadans will still be able to update their registration after Aug. 6, which marks 91 days until the general election and the last day counties are legally allowed by the NVRA to conduct routine voter maintenance that inactivates registration.

People can register to vote or check and update their voter registration at vote.NV.gov.

Nevada allows for same-day voter registration, meaning voters can register in-person during the state’s two-week early voting period or on Election Day, which this year is Tuesday, Nov. 5.

The nearly 157,000 notices sent by counties represent people who were sent official election mail this year (for the presidential preference primary or the June primary), had that mail returned as undeliverable, and did not appear to vote or update their voter registration during the election cycle.

Nevadans who receive official voter mail — such as a sample ballot or an actual ballot — to their address for someone who no longer lives there are encouraged to write “return to sender” on the mail and place it in the mailbox so that it can be marked as undeliverable. Doing so will mean the person the mail was intended for can be flagged for inactivation the next time routine voter maintenance is conducted.

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April Corbin Girnus is an award-winning journalist and deputy editor of Nevada Current. A stickler about municipal boundary lines, April enjoys teaching people about unincorporated Clark County. She grew up in Sunrise Manor and currently resides in Paradise with her husband, three children and one mutt.