32 Cortez Masto, Laxalt race tightens with latest vote count update

Cortez Masto is 821 votes from catching Republican Adam Laxalt after more counties submitted their mail-in ballot numbers Friday afternoon.

Laxalt is leading Cortez Masto by a slim 0.1 percentage point, at 48.5 percent versus 48.4 percent.

In addition to rural counties needing to finish their counting, Clark County still has thousands of mail-in ballots to tabulate, plus thousands of ballots that need to go through a curing process and provisional ballots that need verification.

Down-ballot races called

Meanwhile, Democratic incumbent Aaron Ford will win reelection as Nevada’s attorney general after defeating Republican opponent Sigal Chattah, the Associated Press projects.

Ford was leading Chattah by seven percentage points as of Friday evening with 50.8 percent of the vote. Chattah held 43.8 percent.

Ford first declared victory in the race on Thursday. Chattah posted a message to her Twitter account thanking her supporters, which was later followed by her account being deleted completely.

In a statement Thursday, Ford thanked his staff and team.

“Our electoral win today is a win for justice and for the entire Nevada family. We’re building a stronger, more inclusive future for Nevada together — and I couldn’t be more excited to continue this work,” Ford said.

Ford, who previously served as a senator in the Nevada Legislature, became the states first Black attorney general when he won the position in 2018. Throughout the campaign, he received endorsements from a number of notable Republicans, including former state Republican Party Chair Amy Tarkanian.

In an email to supporters, Chattah shared a message similar to her Tweet.

“I want to extend a heartfelt thank you to every single one of you,” the email reads. “Almost 400,000 people voted for me. Simply amazing.”

Chattah declined to comment.

The AP also projects Republican Stavros Anthony will be Nevada’s next lieutenant governor after defeating appointed incumbent Lisa Cano Burkhead.

Anthony was leading Cano Burkhead by 5.3 percentage points as of Friday with 50.3 percent of the votes to Cano Burkhead’s 45 percent.

“I am very grateful that the residents of the state of Nevada have put their faith in me in being their next lieutenant governor,” Anthony said.

With his 13 years of experience on the Las Vegas City Council, seven years on the higher education system board of regents and 29 years in the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department, Anthony said he will take his public service duty seriously.

Anthony said he will focus on the responsibilities of lieutenant governor, from promoting tourism, supporting small businesses and helping police chiefs and sheriffs through homeland security. As president of the Nevada Senate, he will promote constitutionally conservative values, he said.

Anthony also ran unsuccessfully for mayor in 2015 and lost a bid for the Clark County Commission in 2020 by just 10 votes.

In the race for state controller, Republican Andy Matthews defeated Democrat Ellen Spiegel 50.9 percent to 45.3 percent, the Associated Press projected Friday.

“It’s a real honor to be elected and I’m so grateful to the voters of Nevada for putting this trust in me. I look forward to serving as our next state controller,” Matthews said.

Matthews campaigned on a platform of increased transparency in government, and that is what he plans to bring to the office, he said.

Several legislative races have also been called. In the state Senate, Democrat Edgar Flores defeated Republican Leo Henderson in District 2. In District 10, Democrat Fabian Donate defeated Republican Philip Graviet, and in District 20, Republican Jeff Stone defeated Democrat Brent Foutz.

Clark County counting update

In Nevada’s most populous county and the state’s most Democratic-leaning hub, 50,030 mail ballots still need to be counted — 15,900 of which will be sent to tabulation today, Clark County Registrar of Voters Joe Gloria said during the county’s daily news conference about the ballot counting.

The other 34,130 mail ballots will be counted as they become ready. Not all would be counted Friday, Gloria said.

Clark County has the largest share of outstanding mail ballots that need to be counted; most are the more than 56,000 ballots that were dropped off by voters at ballot drop boxes Tuesday. The deadline to count all mail-in ballots is Tuesday, Gloria said, which the county is on track to complete.

The county expects another large report of vote totals to be posted Saturday, Gloria said.

“We’re getting to the tail end of what we need to do,” Gloria said.

There are also 9,659 ballots to “cure,” which happens if a voter’s signature on the mail ballot envelope doesn’t match the one on file with the county elections office. Voters are contacted and asked to verify the legitimacy of their ballot in those cases.

In addition, 5,555 provisional ballots will be added to the ballot counts once they are validated.

Close races down ballot

Some smaller races in Clark County are separated by just a few hundred votes. In the race for Assembly District 12, for instance, Republican Flemming Larsen is leading Democrat Max E. Carter II by 98 votes.

And in the secretary of state race, Democrat Cisco Aguilar now leads by 5,400 votes over Republican Jim Marchant, who has been a driving force behind the push to eliminate electronic voting machines in Nevada and elsewhere, based on the unproven allegation that the 2020 election was stolen. Marchant went as far as to question his own primary victory in June.

On Thursday, Gloria said the county still had “over 50,000 ballots that need to be counted,” and said his staff would work through Friday’s Veteran’s Day holiday as well as the weekend if needed to count the remaining ballots.

Meanwhile Washoe County, the state’s second-largest population hub, has roughly 23,000 ballots remaining to report, barring any additional mail ballots that may trickle in Friday and Saturday.

Those mail ballots slowed down significantly Thursday, with Clark receiving just 626 ballots from the postal service, while Washoe received about 200.

Contact Colton Lochhhead at clochhead@reviewjournal.com. Follow @ColtonLochhead on Twitter. Contact Jessica Hill at jehill@reviewjournal.com. Follow @jess_hillyeah on Twitter. Contact Taylor R. Avery at TAvery@reviewjournal.com. Follow @travery98 on Twitter.