LAS VEGAS (KTNV) — Most voters have confidence the 2026 election will be counted accurately, but concerns remain over who and how voting is conducted.
That's according to a new poll from The Terrance Group, conducted for the Democracy Defense Foundation, a non-partisan group that works to increase confidence in elections.
WATCH | Senior political reporter Steve Sebelius breaks down the data in the poll:
According to the poll of 600 likely Nevada voters, 76% are either very or somewhat confident that the 2026 election will be accurately counted. Just 23% said it would not be.
Those results crossed party lines, with 65% of Republicans expressing confidence, along with 92% of Democrats and 75% of independents.
That's good news for the Foundation in Nevada, where former Republican Gov. Brian Sandoval and former Democratic Assembly Speaker Richard Perkins are co-chairs.
"To the extent that the Democracy Defense Foundation gets into the ears of folks in Nevada and educates them, the goal here is really to get as many people to vote as possible," said Perkins in an interview with Channel 13. "When more people vote, our elections are better and we have better outcomes. So, you know, we don't want anybody to be disenfranchised."
Voter concerns
But when it comes to various methods of casting ballots, voters had concerns.
Overall, 89% had confidence in early in-person voting, with just 9% saying they were not very, or not at all, confident.
But when asked about mail-in voting, those numbers changed considerably, with 59% saying they were confident in mail-in voting, and 39% saying they were not confident in it.
Republicans were the most skeptical. Just 33% said they were very or somewhat confident in mail-in voting, with 66% saying they were not confident. Democrats had the most faith in mail-in voting, with 87% expressing confidence and just 11% saying they were not confident.
A small number of voters said they simply weren't sure.
Perhaps ironically, mail-in voting has quickly become the most popular way to cast a ballot in Nevada, with between 45% and 60% of voters choosing to use mail ballots in general elections in 2022, 2024 and in the 2026 primary.
The counties with the largest percentages of voters mailing in their choices in the most recent primary were Douglas County at 76.7% and Nye County at 72.62%. Both counties are heavily Republican.
The results should not be surprising, with national leaders such as President Donald Trump casting aspersions on mail-in voting, suggesting it could allow for fraud.
Republicans recently lost a Supreme Court case when they tried to prevent the state of Mississippi from counting votes postmarked by Election Day but received afterward. Nevada has a similar law on the books.
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Perkins said the national debate affected the poll numbers here in Nevada.
"When you hear the national rhetoric constantly beating up on mail-in ballots, it's going to have an effect. But what we've seen is at least in operations, it's just not the case," he said.
Non-citizen voting
The poll also found concerns over non-citizens casting votes in elections: 58% of voters overall said they were concerned, with just 41% saying they were not concerned.
The issue wasn't as concerning to voters as cyberattacks that could affect election results (74% concerned), court decisions that could change election rules (78% concerned) or federal pressure on Nevada officials (62% concerned).
But the results do take on significance in light of President Trump's push to pass the SAVE America Act, which would require documentary proof of citizenship before a person could register to vote.
The poll was taken June 27-30, before President Trump's news conference questioning election integrity, and before federal officials sent some states letters alleging that non-citizens had been added to the voting rolls.
But 90% of Republicans and 58% of independents still said they were somewhat or very concerned about non-citizens voting in elections. Just one-quarter of Democrats said they were somewhat or very concerned about the issue, with 69% saying they were not at all concerned about it.
Secretary of State Cisco Aguilar has said there are safeguards against non-citizens registering to vote, and doing so is a crime. But the federal government has claimed that there are more than 8,500 people on Nevada's voter rolls whose information matches non-citizens in their databases.
In New Jersey, Gov. Mikie Sherrill confirmed that a software error had allowed more than 6,000 non-citizens to register to vote, and confirmed more than 400 had actually cast ballots.
Perkins was skeptical of the claims, but said they would be investigated.
"I don't think the allegations are warranted. We've gone back over time, and you know for more than a decade, these allegations have been out there without any evidence and nobody has been able to show this to happen," he said. "I think that that's going to be important that we're transparent, we show the facts that the investigation will bear out, and just the fact that it's very, very difficult in Nevada for a non-citizen to register to vote. There are just too many hoops to jump through."
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