This isn't Burgess' first time working in elections and it isn't even her first time following a predecessor who left as a result of the difficult working conditions registrars and clerks have faced since the Big Lie — the baseless conspiracy theory that the 2020 election was stolen thanks to massive voter fraud. 

Democrats [Attorney General Aaron] Ford and [Secretary of State Cisco] Aguilar would tell you they're not just talking a good game, but are bringing a strategy into the struggle to protect and maintain fair elections.

Clark and Douglas counties are both looking to hire more poll workers amid a shortage that comes after the rise in threats against workers following the 2020 election.

In Nevada, the counties that have seen turnover since the 2020 election are: Clark, Douglas, Elko, Eureka, Lander, Lyon, Mineral, Nye, Storey, Washoe and Carson City.

Lorena Portillo, 47, has worked in the county elections department for 25 years, starting out in a part-time position to make ends meet as a young mom earning her associate degree.

Jamie Rodriguez, Washoe County's interim registrar of voters, is among those stepping into an election oversight role at a time marked by mass misinformation and distrust.

In an August 2021 email to an Elko County deputy district attorney, Steninger laid out the group's interest in having "the rural counties … announce plans to shift to paper ballots," which they believed would make the rest of the state "obliged to follow suit."

Marchant said his plan with Kampf involves using "paper ballots with anti-counterfeit measures," conducting voting and counting "on a precinct-level basis" and livestreaming — though he did not specify what would be streamed. 

A Republican Washoe County commissioner is proposing sweeping changes to the election system for the state's second-largest county, including ensuring that almost all ballots are paper.

The rise in violent threats has sparked a national exodus of election workers. Dozens of local election officials in Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin have left their positions in the past 14 months. In Nevada, similar changes are happening.

But heading into the 2022 midterms, Democrats no longer have a clear advantage in voter registration, as non-major party voters surpassed Democratic and Republican voters for the first time in state history last August.

The fight over how Nevada conducts elections may have subsided since last year's election but roared back in full view on Thursday, as state lawmakers held hearings on two measures that drew partisan battle lines and could have a profound effect on election cycles in the state.

Joe Biden's slim lead over President Donald Trump in Nevada remained unchanged on Wednesday after several hours of will-they-or-won't-they from state and local elections officials in Nevada who had earlier in the day said they would release new numbers in the tight and increasingly important contest.

State and county officials say that ballots are sent to the wrong address because of issues with keeping voter rolls up to date. Election officials are typically not informed when someone moves out of state or to a different in-state residence (unless they register to vote at that new address), so there is sometimes a lag between addresses listed on the rolls and actual residences of voters.

The deadline —- which applies to mail and in-person voter registration — is most important for recent arrivals to Nevada or people who don't have a Nevada driver's license or ID card, according to Washoe County Registrar Deanna Spikula. State identification is key for registering to vote online or getting registered at a polling place on Election Day or during early voting, which begins Oct. 17.

Attorney General Aaron Ford, a Democrat, said in an interview on Thursday that he considered the president's comments to be a "dog whistle" encouraging voter intimidation, citing the president's past comments suggesting that voters cast both mail and in-person ballots to test the system and his instruction for the right-wing extremist "Proud Boys" group to "stand back and stand by."

The mailings arrive in an election year when the president of the United States is suing Nevada over a bill expanding mail-in voting for the general election and the U.S. Postal Service sent a postcard with inaccurate information about mail-in voting in Nevada.

The vast majority of votes in Nevada were cast through ballots that were either mailed in or dropped off at locations throughout the state, but the state reported on Thursday that several thousand Nevadans chose to vote in person. Those that did elect to fill out ballots on site were met with long lines at the state's limited number of polling locations.