Judge tosses Ahern Hotel’s lawsuit over COVID crowd limits

A Clark County justice connected Friday tossed retired a Las Vegas hotel’s lawsuit challenging exigency occupancy limits imposed statewide past twelvemonth to stem the dispersed of COVID-19, ruling that with those restrictions present lifted the substance was moot.

The Ahern Hotel and Convention Center, cited and fined past twelvemonth for aggregate violations of the authorities bounds connected gatherings, filed suit past August against Gov. Steve Sisolak, the metropolis and state, and the city’s manager of planning, Robert Summerfield.

Besides ruling the substance moot, District Judge Nancy Allf connected Friday besides said Ahern failed to authorities an actionable assertion due to the fact that the state’s actions to stem the COVID-19 pandemic were reasonable.

“Today, the tribunal recognized what we already knew — the authorities has a work to support the lives of Nevadans,” Attorney General Aaron Ford said successful a connection connected the ruling.

The edifice was cited past August and fined $250 by the metropolis for violating an exigency directive that constricted attendance astatine nationalist gatherings and backstage events to 50 people. The regulation was imposed past twelvemonth arsenic the coronavirus took clasp and dispersed statewide. The edifice had hosted an “Evangelicals for Trump” run lawsuit connected Aug. 6, 2020, which drew astir 550 radical to its normal center.

The Trump lawsuit drew Sisolak’s ire, with the politician saying astatine the clip helium was “deeply disheartened and dismayed to spot the callous and unsafe behavior” successful usurpation of the gathering limit. The hotel, owned by Don Ahern, a salient backer of GOP causes, maintained that it and different hotels should not beryllium taxable to the gathering limit.

Three days aft the Trump gathering, the edifice hosted a 2nd event, the Mrs. Nevada quality pageant, which drew astir 200 people. It was subsequently deed with an $11,000 fine by the state’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration for a full of 4 violations.

“These exigency directives are designed to support Nevadans harmless from a deadly microorganism portion besides balancing their rights arsenic individuals,” Ford said successful his statement, adding that the tribunal “agreed that we struck the close equilibrium with this directive.”

Contact Capital Bureau newsman Bill Dentzer astatine bdentzer@reviewjournal.com. Follow @DentzerNews connected Twitter.