Trump sues over 'noncitizen voting' claim that state GOP official debunked years earlier

Former President Donald Trump and Republican officials have filed a lawsuit against Nevada Secretary of State Cisco Aguilar, alleging that as many as 4,000 non-citizens may have voted in the 2020 presidential election, even though the previous Republican secretary of state investigated the claim — and dismissed it as likely a misunderstanding.

That's according to a Las Vegas Review-Journal report published Thursday.

“Nevada’s elections should be a reflection of its citizens’ voices, not influenced by non-citizens who have no legal standing to participate,” said state GOP Chairman Michael McDonald, who seeks in the suit to force Aguilar to create a new system to verify voters' citizenship. “Any efforts to allow non-citizens to vote threatens the very foundation of our elections and diminishes the power of lawful voters across our state. This isn’t just a legal issue—it’s about protecting the rights of Nevadans and preserving the integrity of our elections.”

The basis of the lawsuit is that the Republican Party of Nevada identified 6,360 people registered to vote who were also in the state Department of Motor Vehicles' “non-citizen file.” Of those, 3,987 of those people voted in 2020.

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But according to the report, Barbara Cegavske, the former Republican secretary of state, looked into the claims three years ago and determined these voters likely became naturalized citizens at some point between when they obtained their licenses at the DMV and when they registered to vote. The allegations, according to her investigation, represented “an incomplete assessment of voter registration records.”

Voting or registering to vote as a non-citizen in federal elections is already illegal, with only a small handful of cities permitting non-citizens to vote in local elections. The National Voter Registration Act provides for certain ways states can verify people registered to vote can legally do so while not creating undue burdens for voters; Republicans have sought to chip away at these protections by making it harder for people to vote altogether.

This comes soon after a federal judge dismissed a separate lawsuit in Nevada by the GOP that sought to block mail-in ballots arriving after Election Day from being counted, even if they were postmarked by the correct deadline.