Delayed vote tallies in Calfornia are attributable to the vote-by-mail system and weeklong deadlines for receiving ballots, which undermines confidence in results, election experts say.<\/p>\n
Tuesday is the deadline for the last of California\u2019s ballots to arrive, where about 80% vote by mail and about 40% of ballots arrive after Election Day in the nation\u2019s most populous state. These are among the factors that contribute to repeatedly delayed results.<\/p>\n
On Sunday, it appeared that Republican mayoral candidate Spencer Pratt would fall out of contention for the general election after several days of appearing in the top two vote recipients along with L.A. Mayor Karen Bass, a Democrat. Another Democratic candidate, Nithya Raman, appeared to overtake Pratt for second place to face Bass in the general election. The state\u2019s primaries allow the top two vote-getters, rather than party nominees, to advance to the general election.<\/p>\n
California also doesn\u2019t allow local jurisdictions to require voter ID, and allows 22 days for \u201ccuring\u201d ballots. Curing is when a voter\u2019s ballot needs to be corrected or clarified to count, such as fixing illegible marks on the ballot or inserting a missing signature on the ballot envelope.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere are a lot of consequential House races in the general election. We are likely going to have a similar conversation in November,\u201d Andrew Behl, a law team staff writer for Ballotpedia, which monitors election procedures, told the Daily Signal.<\/p>\n
Similar apparent flips have occured in previous elections in the state, including in races for the U.S. House of Representatives. On election night in 2024, Republican incumbent Rep. Michelle Steel was leading, but that lead turned into a loss days later as Democrat Derek Tran won the seat 22 days after the election.<\/p>\n
In 2024, 80.8 percent of voters used mail-in voting in California. This figure does not include early in-person voting, according to a Ballotpedia report<\/a> that contrasted California\u2019s election procedures with Florida\u2019s.<\/p>\n Both states have large voter populations. Among the biggest differences between them is that Florida has strict timelines for tabulating and reporting results, Behl said. Florida also allows election officials to count, but not report, early in-person and mail votes before Election Day, in contrast to California, which requires tabulation to wait until after the Election Day polls close.<\/p>\n California became an all-mail voting state during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, and the state Legislature codified all-mail elections in 2021. After this act, every registered voter in the state automatically received a ballot.<\/p>\n As long as ballots are postmarked by Election Day, they can arrive up to seven days after the election.<\/p>\n \u201cAbout 23 million ballots were sent to California voters and only about 7 million came back,\u201d Jason Snead, executive director of the Honest Elections Project, told the Daily Signal.<\/p>\n \u201cCalifornia has created a system that is at every stage as insecure as possible,\u201d Snead, executive director of the Honest Elections Project, told the Daily Signal.<\/p>\n He added that California has no laws against ballot harvesting or against third parties delivering or picking up ballots in large quantities.<\/p>\n \u201cThe desire to get election results on election night cuts across every party,\u201d Snead added. \u201cWhen people repeatedly see results change, or one candidate concedes and then becomes a victor, it opens the door for speculation.\u201d<\/p>\n Over the weekend, President Donald Trump did far more than speculate, effectively declaring the California elections \u201ccrooked.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThousands of homeless may be fueling Nithya Raman\u2019s impossible late surge in LA. Voter fraud was just busted on Skid Row,\u201d Trump posted on Truth Social. \u201cThis is why nobody trusts their elections anymore.\u201d<\/p>\n \ud83d\udea8BREAKING: Thousands of homeless may be fueling Nithya Raman\u2019s impossible late surge in LA<\/p>\n Voter fraud was just busted on Skid Row<\/p>\n CA refuses to clean its voter rolls & no voter ID<\/p>\n This is why nobody trusts their elections anymore<\/p>\n