LAS VEGAS (KTNV) — Clark County's ballot boxes have a new boss ahead of election year 2024. Lorena Portillo is now the registrar of voters.
Portillo will be the person responsible for ensuring federal, state, and local elections are done correctly in the county.
She was born and raised in Las Vegas, and now becomes the first ever Latina woman appointed by the Board of Clark County Commissioners to be the registrar of voters.
Portillo fills the vacancy left by the former registrar, Joe Gloria, after he retired.
"I fell in love with the process and began promoting through the department. This is the only department in Clark County I've worked in, so all I do know is elections," Portillo said.
She started in the election department in 1998 as a part-time employee in the administration division. Now, she leads the process in Nevada's most populous county.
"We do lead here in Clark County as far as the election Department is concerned. State level, we have the most number of voters here in the state of Nevada," said Portillo.
Nevada Secretary of State Francisco V. Aguilar. later told KTNV, "Accountability and transparency are key to building trust in our elections and i think some of the technology you see the city using is some of the new technology that you're going to see the entire state start to use especially with our VREM system, the Voter Registration Election Management system, that will be a huge opportunity for us to raise the level of transparency."
Portillo and her team are readying for a busy 2024. Nevada's "purple state" status earns it a lot of national attention during election seasons. "We continue to enhance our, you know, our systems, our technology. And you have to be open to that," she said.
Last election, mail in ballots presented unique challenges for election workers who faced a rise in threats to election headquarters and claims of voter fraud. Portillo said she will continue to make sure everything is done at the highest level of professional election standards.
"Number one, we're very we have many processes in place. We have our website that has a wealth of knowledge that provides so much information that we wish many voters would go to. Now that I see everything we have, wow, we can really provide better service and much more transparency."
Governor Joe Lombardo has recently proposed legislation to put an end to universal mail-in voting in the Silver State. The bill would require an ID to vote and move up the deadline for completed mail-in ballots to be received.
"We know that some laws may impact us financially. You know, change our processes and we definitely are there to ensure that the anyone that asks us about our election process knows exactly what we do here," said the new registrar.
Portillo also has a goal to continue getting more minorities educated about the voting process—just like she did back in 2002 when she translated all voting materials into Spanish. "It is a great honor to say I am Latina. I am the registrar of voters," she told KTNV.
