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<\/p>\nIn the June primary, 1.7% of vote-by-mail ballots cast were rejected, in most cases because the ballot was not received on time. Election officials and advocates pointed to USPS changes and late-deciding voters.<\/p>\n
Jul 24, 2026<\/p>\n
Updated 4:16 pm PT<\/p>\n
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Election workers sort ballots at Contra Costa County’s election operations facility on May 27, 2026 in Martinez, California. Of the 148,241 vote-by-mail ballots left uncounted in California, 93,497 were rejected for late arrival. \u00a0(Benjamin Fanjoy\/Getty Images)<\/p>\n
California election<\/a> officials rejected nearly 150,000 ballots in the June 2 primary election, an increase of tens of thousands over recent elections, according to a report from the secretary of state\u2019s office.\u00a0<\/p>\n That accounted for 1.7% of all vote-by-mail ballots cast, marking the state\u2019s highest rejection rate since 2014, according to the California Voter Foundation. Most of the rejected ballots were reported as \u201cnot received on time,\u201d which can mean that the ballot was either postmarked after Election Day or arrived in election offices after the June 9 receipt deadline.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s always troubling to see an increase,\u201d said Kim Alexander, president of the California Voter Foundation. \u201cBallots rejected due to lateness are almost always because they\u2019re postmarked too late \u2014 not because they don\u2019t arrive during the grace period.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n Election officials and voting advocates attribute late ballots to changes in U.S. Postal Service practices that could result in mailpieces not being postmarked on the same day they were mailed, as well as a competitive primary for governor that left many voters undecided<\/a> until the final days of the campaign.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cOur experience in this election was that voters were waiting until the last minute to vote a lot more than what we\u2019ve seen in past elections,\u201d said Matt Moreles, the registrar of voters in Santa Clara County, which had the highest rate of vote-by-mail ballot rejections in the Bay Area at 2.6%.\u00a0<\/p>\n In California, every voter receives a ballot in the mail by default, roughly a month before Election Day. Ballots returned in the mail must be postmarked by Election Day and arrive at the county registrar\u2019s office within a week<\/a> after that.\u00a0<\/p>\n California law allows election officials to resolve signature issues for weeks after Election Day. Under the process known as ballot \u201ccuring,\u201d registrars are allowed to contact voters with a missing or mismatched signature and give them a chance to fix it.<\/p>\n Voting advocates argue that ballot rejections are a far more pertinent issue for state lawmakers to address than exceedingly rare cases of voter fraud.<\/p>\n In each of California\u2019s last five statewide elections, more than 100,000 residents did not have their vote counted because their ballot arrived too late or had a signature issue.<\/p>\n \u201cTo me it\u2019s always disappointing to see ballot rejection happening, because it\u2019s a lot of work to be a California voter,\u201d said Alexander. \u201cBut the fact that you see all of these ballots being rejected is evidence of the careful work election officials undertake each election to make sure that only valid ballots cast are counted and that nobody is voting more than once.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/CaliforniaBallotsSupremeCourtAP.jpg\")
Ballots are sorted the day after California\u2019s primary election at the L.A. County Ballot Processing Center on June 3, 2026, in City of Industry, California.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/GettyImages-2256657926.jpg\")
Gov. Gavin Newsom speaks to the press on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum (WEF) annual meeting in Davos on Jan. 20, 2026.<\/p>\n