(The Center Square) - In Nevada, as in most states, some American citizens born abroad can vote in the state – even if they've never lived there.
They can do so as long as Nevada is their parents' most recent home before leaving the U.S.
The Nevada Republican Party has sued the state in a federal court over the voting rights of these individuals, saying they violate the state constitution.
The law was seen as a victory for military families when it was originally passed, but the recent lawsuit comes amid a wider push among national Republicans against overseas voters.
The lawsuit - filed by the Republican National Committee, Nevada Republican Party and Republican secretary of state candidate Jim Marchant in the U.S. District Court for Nevada - said the law violated the state constitution requirement for voters to have lived in Nevada.
“... Nevada may not create bona fide Nevada voters out of individuals who have never resided in Nevada, solely by reference to a parent’s historical voting eligibility,” read the June 29 complaint. “Residency is not inherited and cannot be established by proxy. An individual who has never personally made Nevada his or her home necessarily has not ‘actually ... resided in the state.’ ”
The Nevada Constitution says residents must live in the state for six months to vote.
The Secretary of State’s Office told The Center Square it does not keep records on how many of these overseas voters participate in the state's elections. A 2024 report by the Federal Voting Assistance Program found that nearly 250,000 votes were recorded by overseas voters that year. That's an estimated 11% of eligible U.S. citizens abroad under the 1986 federal Uniformed and Overseas Citizens Absentee Voting Act.
In addition to Nevada, similar state laws for never-resident overseas voters exist in 37 other states.
When Nevada passed its Uniformed Military and Overseas Absentee Voters Act in 2011, it was signed into law by then-Gov. Brian Sandoval, a Republican. It was also passed by both houses of the Legislature with unanimous support.
“The lawsuit challenging Nevada’s protections for certain overseas voters is an attack on the voting rights of eligible U.S. citizens living abroad, and military families whose lives are shaped by service and sacrifice,” Aguilar told The Center Square in a statement. “They risk everything to defend our freedoms, including the fundamental right to vote, and Nevada has a responsibility to protect their access to the ballot and the rights of the families who serve alongside them.”
As the overseer of elections in Nevada, Aguilar is listed in the lawsuit as a defendant, alongside the Democratic National Committee and Nevada State Democratic Party.
The RNC and Nevada Republican Party did not respond to requests for comment by The Center Square. Neither responded to questions about Marchant’s participation in the lawsuit against Aguilar, to whom he lost the 2022 Secretary of State election and is currently running to unseat on Nov. 3.
The RNC has recently filed similar lawsuits against overseas voters in at least six other states, including Colorado and Arizona.
The new lawsuit did not explain why the overseas voting law was only now being challenged.
“Children born overseas should not be punished because their parents served, worked or were stationed outside the United States,” said Aguilar. “Nevada will not turn its back on military families simply because their service took them away from home.”
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