Why counting votes in California takes long — here is what to expect

When elections happen in the United States, winners are often projected on election night or by the next morning.

That is not always the case in California.

Voters across the state cast ballots on June 2 in several high-profile races, including the contest to replace term-limited Gov. Gavin Newsom and the race for mayor of Los Angeles.

Yet days later, some contests remain too close to call.

In the governor’s race, Republican Steve Hilton leads with 27.2 percent of the vote, followed by Democrat Xavier Becerra at 26 percent and billionaire activist Tom Steyer at 20.2 percent, according to Thursday returns. In the Los Angeles mayor’s race, Karen Bass leads with nearly 35 percent of the vote, followed by Spencer Pratt with about 29 percent and Nithya Raman with roughly 23 percent.

According to election experts, the delay is less about malfunction and more about how California has designed its voting system.

“There’s no other state that has nearly the expansive voting engagement as California does,” said Mike Madrid, a Republican consultant who has worked on numerous campaigns. “California has many ways that people can vote and fewer restrictions, but the other part is also just basically the size of the state and the number of people that participate.”

Why the count takes time

California allows voting by mail, in person at vote centers, through secure drop boxes and by provisional ballot. Election officials can process many mailed ballots before Election Day — verifying signatures and preparing envelopes for tabulation — but they cannot count the votes until polls close.

Pollster Paul Mitchell said the system prioritizes access over speed.

“It’s basically trying to make sure that you can vote any way you want to,” Mitchell said. “You can vote by mail, you can go to a polling place and use a machine, you can go to a drop box.”

California also accepts ballots that arrive after Election Day as long as they were postmarked on time. Voters have up to 14 days to cure certain signature or identification problems, giving election officials additional time to verify ballots that might otherwise be rejected.

“California law prioritizes counting every valid ballot, not just the fastest ballots,” a spokesperson for the Los Angeles County Registrar told The California Post.

Mitchell said many voters wait until the final days to mail or return their ballots.

“A lot of them are literally mailing their ballots and postmarking them on Election Day or the day before,” he said. “That means there’s a window where hundreds of thousands — even millions — of ballots can still arrive after Tuesday.”

Logistics can slow things further.

In places like Capitola, a ballot mailed just a couple of miles from the registrar may first travel to a central postal sorting facility in Santa Clara County before being routed back. Similarly, in remote towns like Independence, mail might travel hundreds of miles to a regional center before returning locally because that’s how the postal system is organized.

“The law allows a two-week period where, if a ballot is sent to the wrong county, that county can forward it to the proper county, and as long as it’s sent within that two-week period, it can still be counted,” Mitchell said.

Election workers must then verify signatures, resolve voter registration issues and process ballots that may have been sent to the wrong county before being forwarded to the correct one.

Staffing can also be a factor.

Counties face intense workloads during a relatively short election window, and adding enough temporary staff to dramatically accelerate counting would require significant additional funding.

“If the state spent the money to give county registrars larger staffs so they could facilitate the counting of ballots at the end, I’m sure counties could get the count done quicker. But that would be a huge investment in staff for something that is really short term,” Mitchell said.

On the county level, there are between 600 to 700 employees, “ranging from seasonal and permanent staff,” according to the registrar.

The tradeoff: access vs. speed

Supporters of California’s system argue that the goal is to maximize participation and reduce barriers to voting. Critics say the lengthy count can erode public confidence even when there is no evidence of fraud.

“The longer that it takes, the more you’re trying to find accuracy in what’s going on,” Madrid said. “But what I will say is, I think this long of a count does undermine confidence in elections. It’s not because of integrity, but because of efficiency. People are asking, ‘Why is this taking so long?’ and California is going to have to remedy that.”

Madrid called the situation a “double-edged sword.”

“It’s one thing to inspire confidence and allow voter enfranchisement by letting people vote basically any way they want to,” he said. “But you can’t also undermine that same goal by waiting weeks to count the votes. You’re undermining the confidence in the system you’re trying to instill confidence in.”

The debate has also become political.

President Donald Trump has repeatedly criticized California’s election system, including in a recent Truth Social post.

“The Dumocrats are at it again! They are trying to STEAL THE GOVERNOR OF CALIFORNIA PRIMARY, AND THE MAYOR OF LOS ANGELES PRIMARY, AWAY FROM TWO GREAT REPUBLICAN CANDIDATES. Here we go with the very late and massive numbers of MAIL IN BALLOTS,” he said without providing evidence of voter fraud.

How California compares

California’s lengthy vote-counting process stands in contrast to many other states that routinely report results within hours of polls closing.

States such as Florida and Texas typically produce near-complete unofficial results on election night because they process large numbers of mail ballots before Election Day and impose stricter deadlines for receiving ballots. Florida, for example, counted more than 11 million votes in the 2024 presidential election and reported the vast majority of results within hours of polls closing.

Other Democratic-leaning states, including Oregon and Washington, also rely heavily on vote-by-mail systems but generally count fewer ballots overall than California and do not administer elections on the same scale.

“Other states also take time, and you can look up their certification dates,” the spokesperson for the country said. “The difference is scale: California and L.A. County have a much larger voter volume.”

Madrid said California’s challenge is balancing voter access with timely results.

“California is essentially trying to maximize participation,” he said. “The tradeoff is that it can take much longer to finish counting every valid ballot.”

What to expect next

Across the state so far, about 5.17 million ballots have been counted, which represents 56 percent of the total expected vote. That means there are roughly 4.06 million ballots still left to be counted.

Mitchell said the next rounds of updates could be larger than the initial returns because many late-arriving mail ballots are still being processed.

“Those early drops were counted first,” he said. “We’ll probably start seeing much bigger updates in the coming days.”

Analysts generally expect the remaining ballots to lean more Democratic, particularly in Los Angeles, where Democratic registration significantly outnumbers Republican registration.

“You should see an improvement for Democratic candidates because there are more Democratic ballots outstanding to count,” Madrid said.

“Steyer does still have a chance, but it’s a small and shrinking chance,” Madrid said. “It is mathematically possible, but every day that he does not close the gap considerably, it gets exponentially harder because there are fewer ballots left to count.”

In the Los Angeles mayoral race, incumbent Karen Bass has secured a spot in November’s runoff with nearly 35 percent of the vote. Spencer Pratt currently holds second place with about 29 percent, while City Councilwoman Nithya Raman trails with roughly 23 percent as the race for the final runoff spot remains competitive.

“Now, with Nithya, the advantage for her is that Los Angeles has far more Democratic votes outstanding than Republican votes because it’s L.A.,” Madrid said.

“She should benefit significantly from the number of ballots that are still out there. The likelihood of them breaking in her direction is considerably higher than for Spencer Pratt.”

Election officials say the process will continue over the next several weeks as ballots are received, verified and tabulated.

“I think probably between two or three weeks from Election Day” before the picture is fully clear, Madrid said.

“Close races can take longer because every remaining ballot can matter,” the registrar’s office said.