A Nevada judge has dismissed the yearslong criminal case against six Republicans accused of submitting a fraudulent certificate falsely declaring Donald Trump the winner of the state’s 2020 presidential election.
The ruling marks another major setback in swing states’ efforts to prosecute fake electors who attempted to keep Trump in the White House after he lost to Joe Biden.
Nevada Judge Mary Kay Holthus found there was insufficient evidence that the defendants intended to deceive government officials when they submitted the certificate.
Holthus also determined that the state failed to disclose exculpatory evidence to the grand jury, further undermining the prosecution’s case.
“The fact that Defendants openly announced both their actions and their asserted purpose, rather than concealing their conduct or attempting to secretly induce governmental reliance, weighs against a reasonable inference that they acted with fraudulent intent,” Holthus wrote in her ruling.
Nevada Attorney General Aaron Ford, who is also running for governor as a Democrat, had brought charges relating to forgery and “offering a false instrument for filing or record” against the six defendants, who all pleaded not guilty.
The defendants included Michael McDonald, the chair of the Nevada Republican Party, and Jesse Law, the former chair of the Clark County Republican Party.
After the 2020 election, the six Republican electors gathered outside the Nevada Legislature to sign a certificate awarding the state’s six electoral votes to Trump, despite Biden winning Nevada by more than 30,000 votes.
Prosecutors argued the defendants intended for their documents to be mistaken for actual electoral votes that then-Vice President Mike Pence would count on January 6, 2021.
The defendants maintained that submitting the certificate was an act of “political theater” meant to publicize their concerns about the election, with attorneys arguing they had no intent to deceive any government agency.
In a statement following the ruling, McDonald’s defense attorney Richard Wright called the attorney general’s plans to appeal “hasty” and “premature,” arguing that continuing the case was politically motivated.
Ford’s office confirmed it plans to appeal the dismissal, signaling the legal battle may not yet be fully resolved despite the setback.
The Nevada dismissal joins similar outcomes in Arizona, Michigan, and Georgia, where fake elector cases have also been thrown out or dropped by prosecutors.
Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes recently dismissed her office’s criminal case but vowed to bring it back to a grand jury in hopes of securing another indictment.
A special prosecutor also dropped a federal case in late 2024 that charged Trump with conspiring to overturn the 2020 election, following Trump’s victory over Democratic Vice President Kamala Harris that same year.
A fake electors case remains ongoing in Wisconsin, making it one of the last surviving prosecutions stemming from efforts to challenge the 2020 presidential election results.
