Mayor Goodman recall effort has collected no signatures so far

The group seeking to recall Las Vegas Mayor Carolyn Goodman has not collected a single signature at the halfway mark, organizers told the city this week.

The Committee to Recall Mayor Carolyn Goodman has until Aug. 4 to gather 6,745 valid signatures from registered voters who participated in last year’s municipal primary election. But none had been collected as of June 20, the midway point of the 90-day deadline.

Organizers made the disclosure to City Clerk LuAnn Holmes in a letter Tuesday. They now have between June 21 and Aug. 4 to gather the required signatures, or the recall will fail.

The committee also told Holmes that it had not received nor made any contributions or expenses of more than $100 during the first 45 days of the recall period, although top Democratic donor Stephen J. Cloobeck has previously said he is prepared to spend “whatever it takes” to recall Goodman.

Former professional poker player Doug Polk, who filed the notice of intent to circulate a recall petition on May 6, said Wednesday, “I don’t really have much to say.”

Polk said that since he teamed up with others interested in recalling the mayor, decisions on how to go about collecting signatures needed to be made as a group.

“It’s more that it’s no longer a unilateral decision,” he said.

But Polk said he preferred not to speak to whether there had been difficulties with logistics and coordination. He added that organizers, who did not feel tied to this particular effort, could issue another petition in the future if necessary.

The effort to remove Goodman from office comes as a result of her response to the coronavirus pandemic, including controversial comments she made on national television. In April interviews on CNN and NBC, Goodman said the city should be used as a control group to test whether social distancing measures were working and suggested that businesses that reopen and are hit hard by virus outbreaks would simply be swallowed by competition.

In early May, Polk said that Goodman had “failed to responsibly represent her constituency.”

“Not only in her clear disregard for public health, but also in her support for the casino owners over the people of Las Vegas,” he said in a statement at the time. “Additionally, she is barely able to speak coherent sentences while discussing the subject matter. She is unfit to serve as the mayor of Las Vegas.”

Contact Shea Johnson at sjohnson@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0272. Follow @Shea_LVRJ on Twitter.

A previous version of this story misidentified the day when recall organizers notified the city they had collected no signatures.

Mayor Goodman Recall Letter by Las Vegas Review-Journal on Scribd