Nevada Democrats file ethics complaint against Laxalt, seek information on secret taping from gamers, FBI
The Nevada Democratic Party has filed a state ethics complaint against Attorney General Adam Laxalt and has asked the Gaming Control Board and FBI for relevant records of a secret recording of Laxalt made by GCB Chairman A.G. Burnett.
The documents, first reported by the Associated Press, come as Laxalt has all but cleared the GOP field for the 2018 race for governor and is considered a formidable candidate. The clandestine recording, reported exclusively by The Nevada Independent last month, came after Burnett became suspicious that Laxalt might be trying to influence him to intervene in a civil lawsuit embroiling the attorney general’s major donor, Sheldon Adelson.
Laxalt told the AP the Democratic Party actions were "false and baseless complaints" and the start of a "two-year smear campaign."
All of the documents are linked below.
The ethics complaint alleges violations of two parts of the state law:
----The first is a general statute about ethical conduct: To enhance the people’s faith in the integrity and impartiality of public officers and employees, adequate guidelines are required to show the appropriate separation between the roles of persons who are both public servants and private citizens.
----The second involves an elected official acting in private capacity to help another: A public officer or employee shall not use the public officer’s or employee’s position in government to secure or grant unwarranted privileges, preferences, exemptions or advantages for the public officer or employee, any business entity in which the public officer or employee has a significant pecuniary interest, or any person to whom the public officer or employee has a commitment in a private capacity to the interests of that person. As used in this subsection, “unwarranted” means without justification or adequate reason.
The records requests come after the Gaming Control Board rejected The Nevada Independent’s similar request, citing confidentiality statutes.