The Nevada Republican Party refuted Tuesday’s baseless allegations of voter corruption by Joey Gilbert, the Republican primary candidate for Republican governor.
Joe Lombardo, a former Clark County sheriff, rebranded in primary as a hardline right-wingerThe projection of, is made by the Associated PressGilbert, a COVID Truther and voter fraud conspiracy Theorist, was defeated marched on the Capitol January 6, Lombardo led Gilbert 38.4% – 27.6%, with 82% reporting Wednesday morning.
Gilbert immediately declared that the race would not be conceded and may file a lawsuit to contest the race.
“Maybe the establishment and swamp rats forgot who they’re dealing with,” he wrote on FacebookAdd a rat emoji. “I smell a lawsuit because this STINKS! I will not concede anything. No one likes No Show Joe. I will not concede anything. There’s a reason a real fighter with real legal teams is in this fight.”
The Nevada Republican Party, which has been overthrown by election conspiracy theorists in the wake of former President Donald Trump’s “Big Lie” grift, stoked baseless allegations of fraud after Trump’s 2020 loss and backed his failed lawsuits attempting to overturn these results. The party’s voters on Tuesday nominated for Senate former state Attorney General Adam Laxalt, who has been likened by local media to the “Nevada version of Rudy Giuliani” After leading the Trump lawsuits that failed, vowing lawsuits In his general election matchup months prior to anyone voting. GOP voters also nominated Jim Marchant as secretary of state election denier. vowed to impose New voting restrictions were imposed by the state, and the state is backing other notorious conspirators.
Despite its embrace for election conspiracy theorists and dismay that Gilbert was contesting the results of their primary elections, which like the 2020 presidential race has not seen any evidence indicating widespread fraud or irregularities, the Nevada GOP expressed dismay.
“There’s no indication that There’s any fraud right now,” party Chairman Mike McDonald told the Review-Journal’s Colton Lochhead. “It’s disappointing that those comments come out of the Republican Party.”
“I don’t know what his comments alluded to. My goal is to unite the party and bring everyone together so we have a Republican red wave,” McDonald told the Las Vegas Sun.
McDonald’s comments came under criticism given the party’s headfirst dive into election denialism.
“Can you imagine the chutzpah or stupidity or both that it takes for a guy who helped lead the voter fraud nonsense in 2020 to say something like this?” Jon Ralston, a longtime Nevada reporter and CEO of The Nevada Independent, wrote in response to McDonald’s remarks. “Imagine going through life without caring about truth, without caring how you damage your own party. Absolute joke.”
It’s not just Nevada: Trumpist election denialism has gripped this cycle’s Republican primaries. More than 100 Republican supporters of Trump’s election lies have already won party nominating contests just a third of the way through the primary season, according to a Washington Post analysis. And some aren’t waiting for general elections to cry fraud.
Kandiss Taylor, a right-wing Georgia gubernatorial candidate who received just 3.4% of the vote after running on a platform of “Jesus Guns Babies,” cried fraud After losing the race by over 70 points. Mike Lindell, MyPillow founder, is a Trump ally who spent millions promoting bogus fraud claims. claimed that an unspecified “algorithm” was used to cheat Taylor and vowed a “big investigation” to prove it despite failing to prove any fraud claims since November 2020.
Lindell has pushed the fantastical conspiracy theory that Dominion voter machines are used by Lindell to flip votes from candidates he supports. In testimony before the House Jan. 6 committee, Bill Barr, the former Attorney General, referred to the conspiracy theory. “complete nonsense” and “idiotic,” adding that there is “absolutely zero basis for the allegations.”
Nevertheless, the Republican-led commission of rural Otero County, New Mexico is refusing to certify last week’s primary results because of distrust of Dominion voting machines and voted to recount ballots by hand in violation of state law, according to the AP. The commission, which is led by Cowboys for Trump co-founder Couy Griffin— who was convicted of illegally entering the Capitol grounds on Jan. 6 — previously spent tens of thousands performing a door-to-door audit despite Trump winning the country by 25 points in the 2020 election.
Maggie Toulouse Olive, a Democrat from New Mexico, stated that the commission is in violation of the law and asked for the certification of its results by the state Supreme Court.
“The post-election canvassing process is a key component of how we maintain our high levels of election integrity in New Mexico,” she said in a statement, “and the Otero County Commission is flaunting that process by appeasing unfounded conspiracy theories and potentially nullifying the votes of every Otero County voter who participated in the primary.”
