Nevada Government Websites Face Outage on Election Day

Posted on: November 8, 2022, 05:01h. 

Last updated on: November 9, 2022, 01:08h.

Ed Silverstein @casinoorgedsilv Read More
Expertise: Legal, Tribal Gaming.

Websites for Nevada’s state government, including the Secretary of State’s office, went out around noon PT on Tuesday. The websites got restored a short time later in the day, which happens to be Election Day.

Voters wait to cast their ballots at the Bartley Ranch Park in Reno, Nevada
Voters wait to cast their ballots at the Bartley Ranch Regional Park in Reno, Nevada, pictured above. Election Day was marked by an outage of websites operated by Nevada state agencies and departments. (Image: David Calvert/The Nevada Independent)

Based on initial news reports, it was unclear how extensive the impact on any election activity was. The outage impacted online election pages, the Las Vegas Review-Journal reported.

State government web pages displayed an error message during the outage. The outage lasted less than an hour.

The situation led to what was described as an “inbound network connectivity issue” associated with state servers, the Nevada Department of Administration announced in an online statement.

Sisolak Responds

The outage also impacted the Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV). DMV customers found online and in-person services were curtailed. DMV transactions were suspended during the outage, KLAS, a local TV station, reported.

News of the outage was revealed in a midday tweet from Governor Steve Sisolak, D, who is running Tuesday for reelection.

State websites are back up and functional and I’m grateful for the quick work of the team. State employees will continue to monitor the situation,” Sisolak later posted at about 1 pm on Twitter.

Later today, the Secretary of State’s office is expected to display the online results of Tuesday’s election.

There are some predicted close races in Nevada. Sisolak is being challenged by Joe Lombardo, R, who is currently Clark County sheriff. Adam Laxalt, R, former Nevada Attorney General, is challenging incumbent Senator Catherine Cortez Masto, D.

Last month, another internet outage impacted several of Nevada’s state agencies. On October 14, Nevada was forced to close the DMV and some other agencies after that internet outage, KLAS said. October’s outage was caused by damage to a fiber, the Nevada Department of Administration revealed.

Trump, Obama Visit Nevada

Both Lombardo and Laxalt were endorsed by former Republican President Donald Trump. Trump visited Nevada to campaign for the two Republicans and other GOP candidates.

In addition, former Democratic President Barack Obama recently campaigned in Nevada to boost support for Cortez Masto, as well as other Democratic candidates.

Nevada Republicans also are attempting to unseat three Democratic incumbents in Congress. Mark Robertson (R) is running against US Representative Dina Titus, D. April Becker (R) is opposing Representative Susie Lee, and D. Sam Peters (R) is challenging Steven Horsford, D.

The Culinary Union, which is supporting key Democratic incumbents, told Casino.org last week that its canvassers knocked on more than 800,000 doors and were on track to reach one million Nevada residents by Election Day. The union is backing such Democrats as Sisolak, Cortez Masto, Titus, Horsford, and Lee, as well as Clark County Commissioner Tick Segerblom and North Las Vegas mayoral candidate Pat Spearman.

Recent Polls

But as of last week, PredictIt bettors gave Lombardo an 80% chance of replacing Sisolak and Laxalt a 75% likelihood of replacing Cortez Masto in the Senate.

Nevada voters also are being asked to consider two ballot questions. One relates to equal rights regardless of race, creed, sex, sexual orientation, and gender identity. The other issue is whether to raise the minimum wage to $12 by July 1, 2024.