Six Nevada Republicans, who were accused of submitting a certificate falsely declaring President Donald Trump had won the state’s 2020 presidential election, will not face a trial after a judge dismissed the case against them on Aug. 13.
Nevada Judge Mary Kay Holthus ruled in favor of the defendants, who were Nevada GOP Chair Michael McDonald, Nevada GOP Vice Chairs James DeGraffenreid and Durward Hindle, Clark County GOP Chair Jesse Law, and Douglas County GOP officials Shawn Meehan and Eileen Rice.
Nevada Attorney General Aaron Ford—who, as a Democrat, will challenge Gov. Joe Lombardo, a Republican, in November’s election—brought charges of forgery and “offering a false instrument for filing or record” against the six, who all pleaded not guilty.
Trump won in Nevada by a large margin in 2016, but lost the election in 2020.
The 2020 election, conducted under the COVID-19 pandemic restrictions, was marred by allegations of electoral fraud.
After the Nov. 3, 2020, election, the six Republican electors gathered outside the Nevada Legislature to sign a certificate giving the state’s six electoral college votes to Trump. The ceremony was broadcast online, and the video footage was used by the prosecution as evidence in the case.
It would later emerge that Biden had won Nevada by more than 30,000 votes.
The case brought against the six Nevada defendants centered on their intent in submitting the certificate.
Prosecutors argued that the defendants intended for the certificate to be recognized as Electoral College votes by then-Vice President Mike Pence, who had to determine who had won the election on Jan. 6, 2021.
Defendants Said It Was ‘Political Theater’
But the defendants said signing the certificate online was an act of “political theater” designed to publicize their concerns about alleged electoral fraud.
They said they had no intent to deceive a government agency but were preserving their rights to challenge the official election results.
“Testimony presented to the grand jury established that the submitted certificates were not treated as Nevada’s official electoral certificates and were not accepted for filing or acted upon by the receiving agencies,” she wrote in her ruling.
“Rather, the evidence demonstrated that the documents were recognized for what they were and returned because they could not be accepted.
“The Court further finds the public and political nature of Defendants’ conduct significant in evaluating whether the evidence supports an inference of fraudulent intent.
“Defendants repeatedly explained the purpose of their actions during the televised ceremony and in contemporaneous communications.”
Holthus said she concluded that the state had “failed to present sufficient evidence establishing the essential elements of the offenses charged.”
Nevada Attorney General to Appeal
Ford’s office said it plans to appeal Holthus’s ruling.
McDonald’s defense attorney Richard Wright, in a statement emailed to The Epoch Times, said Holthus’s order was “well reasoned.”
“This hasty, premature announcement of an intention to appeal [by Ford] reeks of continuing a politically motivated and legally doomed prosecution,” Wright wrote.
He accused Ford of wanting to continue a “harassment” and “waste of expensive prosecutorial resources.”
The charges follow a state review of 38 suspected cases of noncitizen voting or related conduct from 2009 to 2025.
