Thursday, Oct. 22, 2026 | 2 a.m.
Editor's note: Este artículo está traducido al español.
Nevada’s projected elector ID request is backmost connected the ballot aft winning overwhelming enactment 2 years agone — and opponents person mounted small nationalist absorption arsenic voters hole to marque the last determination Nov. 3.
Question 7 would amend the Nevada Constitution to necessitate photograph recognition astatine the polls opening with the 2028 predetermination cycle. It won 73% of the ballot successful 2024 and needs a 2nd support to instrumentality effect. Republican Gov. Joe Lombardo is urging voters to o.k. it, portion his Democratic challenger, Attorney General Aaron Ford, has not publically taken a position.
The subdued absorption contrasts with campaigns successful Minnesota and Maine, wherever voters rejected elector ID measures aft voting-rights groups oregon Democratic leaders rallied against them.
In 2012, Minnesota voters rejected a elector ID amendment aft a run by voting-rights groups. In November 2025, Maine voters rejected a elector ID inaugural 64% to 36% aft absorption from Democratic leaders, including the authorities enactment seat and caput of state.
“Part of the crushed wherefore this question has polled astatine higher levels of enactment (in Nevada) is that crossed the country, we person seen Democrats dependable opposition, fervent absorption to elector ID bills; successful Nevada, that has not been the case,” said Athar Haseebullah, enforcement manager of the ACLU of Nevada.
At run rallies successful Pahrump, Reno and Las Vegas, Lombardo has urged Nevadans to ballot yes connected the measure. Ford’s run did not respond to the Sun’s petition for comment.
The 2 are locked successful 1 of the closest governor’s races successful the country.
“People tin spot that you person a enactment that’s successful power, that has made pushing elector ID guardant a cardinal taxable of their case, and you person an absorption enactment that has said thing successful response,” Haseebullah said.
Under Question 7, in-person voters would person to amusement an accepted photograph ID, specified arsenic a driver’s license, passport, subject oregon tribal ID, oregon a pupil ID from a Nevada nationalist college. The ID could beryllium expired for up to 4 years; for voters implicit 70, it could beryllium expired for immoderate magnitude of time.
Mail voters would not request a photograph ID. Instead, they would supply the past 4 digits of their Nevada driver’s licence fig or, if they don’t person one, the past 4 digits of their Social Security number. Voters with neither would usage a fig issued by their region clerk.
The measure’s connection does not accidental what would hap if a elector arrives astatine the polls without an acceptable ID.
Opposition to Question 7 isn’t strong.
The Nevada Voter Freedom Alliance and Nevada Voter ID Coalition — groups against the measurement — reported nary contributions successful the archetypal fractional of this year. Repair the Vote raised $3,000.
U.S. Rep. Dina Titus, D-Nev., the elder subordinate of Nevada’s national delegation who is moving for reelection to a ninth House word successful the 1st Congressional District, said Nevada does not person a elector fraud occupation that would warrant the measure.
“I americium opposed to Question 7 due to the fact that it would enactment an other load connected seniors and others who whitethorn not person a driver’s licence oregon ID paper and impact their quality to formed their votes,” she said.
A spokesperson for U.S. Rep. Steven Horsford, D-Nev., said the congressman “has a agelong grounds of defending voting rights arsenic a cornerstone of our democracy.”
The spokesperson added, “Efforts to marque voting harder tally antagonistic to our nation’s halfway values. Nevada has 1 of the astir unafraid predetermination systems successful the country, and voting present is casual and accessible. He volition support warring to marque definite it stays that way.”
U.S. Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto, D-Nev., who is not up for reelection this year, said, “Nevada has harmless and unafraid elections, and I judge further elector ID proposals similar Question 7 are unnecessary.”
Lombardo’s run said his extremity is to marque it casual for eligible Nevadans to ballot portion making definite their votes are secure.
“The politician powerfully supports Question 7 and encourages Nevadans to ballot yes,” the run said successful a statement. “He made elector ID a precedence connected Day 1 of his administration, and erstwhile Democrats successful the Legislature blocked his effort to bring distant predetermination integrity legislation, helium took it to the radical and led the effort to get elector ID connected the ballot.”
Lombardo’s 2023 elector ID measure stalled successful the Democratic-controlled Legislature. In 2025, though, the Legislature passed a elector ID bill.
Assembly Bill 499, brokered by Assembly Speaker Steve Yeager, D-Las Vegas, paired a elector ID request that mirrored Question 7 with a Democratic-backed enlargement of ballot driblet boxes. It passed June 3, 2025, connected the last time of the legislative session.
Lombardo vetoed AB 499 9 days later.
In his veto message, helium said helium “wholeheartedly” supported elector ID but objected that message ballots could inactive beryllium accepted based solely connected a signature match. Yeager called the veto a “breach of trust.”
Dave Gibbs, a erstwhile Clark County Republican Party seat who leads Repair the Vote, the governmental enactment committee that qualified the measurement for the ballot, said, “The biggest contented we woody with is radical having religion successful the predetermination process.”
Supporters reason that photograph ID requirements forestall fraud and physique nationalist assurance successful elections. Research has recovered nary grounds that elector fraud is simply a wide occupation astatine the authorities oregon national level.
Nevada is 1 of six states with elector ID measures connected the ballot this year, the astir successful a azygous twelvemonth connected record, according to Ballotpedia.
The propulsion comes arsenic President Donald Trump continues to falsely assertion that his nonaccomplishment to Joe Biden successful the 2020 statesmanlike predetermination was the effect of fraud. Courts successful Nevada and different plaything states rejected lawsuits challenging the 2020 results. In December 2020, a Nevada justice ruled the challengers had failed to supply credible and applicable grounds of fraud, and the Nevada Supreme Court upheld the decision.
Only Arkansas and Oklahoma person approved elector ID measures with greater enactment than Nevada’s 73% successful 2024: Arkansas with 79% successful 2018 and Oklahoma with 74% successful 2010.
When elector ID proposals archetypal dispersed aft the disputed 2000 statesmanlike predetermination betwixt George W. Bush and Al Gore, they drew enactment from some parties. That enactment is inactive bipartisan but little azygous than it utilized to be, said William Hicks, interim seat of the section of authorities and justness studies astatine Appalachian State University successful North Carolina.
“They (voters) person heard much articulated campaigns from Democratic elites astir the imaginable antagonistic consequences of elector ID laws,” Hicks said.
Nevadans apt person not, helium said. “They haven’t been fixed a communicative of what sorts of issues those laws whitethorn create.”
Hicks said his probe supports Haseebullah’s view. “When Democrats talk explicitly and articulate problems related to elector ID laws, we bash spot that nationalist sentiment shifts,” helium said.
But Hicks said elite absorption does not erase enactment for elector ID, adjacent among Democrats, and politicians whitethorn beryllium reluctant to reason thing truthful popular. “Nevada Democrats whitethorn conscionable not deliberation that it’s an contented worthy prioritizing close now,” helium said.
“The abbreviated mentation is that voters don’t deliberation precise profoundly astir elector ID laws,” said Charles Stewart, manager of MIT’s Election Data and Science Lab.
Research by David Wilson, dean of the Goldman School of Public Policy astatine the University of California, Berkeley, and New York University prof John Kane recovered that enactment for elector ID drops rapidly erstwhile voters are told astir the costs and burdens it tin create.
“People say, ‘You request an ID to bash a batch of stuff; what’s truthful problematic astir it?’” Wilson said. “If you were to suffer immoderate of those IDs, past you’d recognize the outgo differently.”
For radical who don’t drive, Wilson said, getting a state-issued ID tin instrumentality planning, money, clip and documents they whitethorn not have. A just system, helium said, would necessitate the authorities to supply escaped IDs to everyone.
Still, Wilson doubts a louder Democratic run would displacement results by much than 2 to 4 percent points, due to the fact that elector ID is truthful wide accepted.
“Elites tin marque a lawsuit that it’s atrocious oregon it’s good; the nationalist volition marque their ain determination connected that,” Wilson said.
Haseebullah sees the soundlessness differently.
“Nevada elected Democrats have, by and large, stood quiescent portion these measures were being considered,” helium said. “And that is problematic.”
English (US)·