Candidate left off Washoe County sample ballot petitions Nevada Supreme Court

A state Assembly candidate petitioned the Nevada Supreme Court this week because he and his opponent were left off Washoe County’s printed sample ballots.

“This omission denied voters of Washoe County due process and the ability to research the candidates before going to vote,” Drew Ribar wrote in his filing.

Ribar ran in the Republican primary for Assembly District 40 against incumbent PK O’Neill, who won 76% to 24% — or 1,145 votes to 370 — based on just the Washoe County ballots.

District 40 includes Carson City, Storey County and a little piece of Washoe County, including the neighborhoods near the roundabout at Geiger Grade and Veterans Parkway.

Including all Assembly District 40 Republican voters, O’Neill won with 78% of the vote to Ribar’s 22% — 6,082 to 1,745.

Ribar’s petition to the Supreme Court says he will suffer irreparable harm if Washoe County election officials don’t include his name on a sample ballot and conduct another primary election.

Although it can’t make up for Washoe County’s mistake, it’s worth noting that Ribar couldn't have prevailed even if he’d won every vote in Washoe County. District 40 has more voters outside Washoe and they overwhelmingly supported his opponent.

A total of 1,515 votes were cast in Washoe County for the Assembly District 40 Republican primary.

In Carson City alone — where O’Neill has lived for decades — he received 3,163 more votes than Ribar – 4,359 to 1,196.

O’Neill told the RGJ that he didn’t plan to make an issue out of the sample ballot error.

“We both had the same disadvantage,” he said.

For Ribar, the problem he faced speaks to a larger issue.

“Our elections should not be full of errors,” he said in an email. “My name should have been on all ballots. Along with that ‘error,’ the Republican candidate for (Assembly District) 27 Carmen Ortiz was also left off the Republican sample ballot and replaced with the Democrat candidates.”

Mark Robison is the state politics reporter for the Reno Gazette Journal, with occasional forays into other topics. Email comments to mrobison@rgj.com or comment on Mark’s Greater Reno Facebook page .

This article originally appeared on Reno Gazette Journal: Candidate left off Washoe County sample ballot petitions Nevada Supreme Court