Assisted suicide bill dies in Nevada 

A bill allowing doctor-assisted suicide in Nevada has died after the governor told lawmakers not to bother.

The Nevada Assembly decided against advancing Assembly Bill 346, which would have made it the 11th state, along with the District of Columbia, to legalize physician-assisted suicide.

The Assembly approved the measure 23-19 last month, with several Democrats joining Republicans in opposition. However, since Republican Gov. Joe Lombardo promised to veto it, and it lacked a veto-proof majority in the Assembly, lawmakers decided sending it to the Senate would have been pointless.

The Nevada legislature’s session concludes on June 2, and the deadline to advance priority bills was May 16, News 3 Las Vegas reports.

Assemblyman Joe Dalia, D-Henderson, sponsored the measure. He concluded no matter how much effort he put in, the bill wouldn’t become law this session.

“Our goal from Day 1 was to bring a bipartisan bill that got through both houses in a position where the governor would be comfortable signing it,” Dalia recently told reporters. “Coming into this deadline day, we just didn’t feel like we were going to get there and bridge that divide.” 

Dalia also said he plans to push the measure again in the next session.  

“We’re not deterred; we’re going to keep pressing forward,” Dalia said. “I think we’re confident that we’ll find a way to get there, but this is the sixth time this (bill) has been run. I’m going to keep the fight alive … 

“Hopefully, next session, we can come back with a full head of steam and get this done.” 

Lombardo, who vetoed assisted suicide legislation last session, made clear he would do it again if the bill reached his desk. 

“Expansions in palliative care services and continued improvements in advanced pain management make the end-of-life-provisions in AB346 unnecessary, and I would encourage the 2025 Legislature to disregard AB346 because I will not sign it,” Lombardo said in a statement last month. 

Currently, 10 states allow assisted suicide, mostly Democrat-led ones. Since legalizing it, many states have expanded the scope of the practice.  

Notably, Oregon and Vermont eliminated their assisted suicide residency requirements for out-of-staters in 2022 and 2023, respectively.  

Additionally, Colorado enacted a law in 2024 cutting the waiting period between oral requests from 15 days to seven, establishing waiting-period waivers for some patients and letting advanced practice registered nurses prescribe it. 

Canada legalized assisted suicide in 2016. Assisted suicide became the country’s fifth-leading cause of death by 2022, increasing from 1,018 cases in 2016 to 13,241 cases in 2022.