Do not expect early or even fast results to be reported from the California primaries. Sorry if it hurts the election night parties and prognostications. If you live on the east coast, wait until tomorrow for any true sense of what happened.
Even by Wednesday morning, many races will be undetermined. We will know the winners of races and propositions where the vote is one-sided but often only one candidate will likely be known to have made the top-two in many races.
Historically, the early results will be skewed toward conservative candidates and propositions. Absentee ballots returned as of yesterday show that while Republicans were mailed 26% of the mail-in ballots, 34% of those returned were from Republicans. Democrats are 45% in both. (An aside: People over 65 were mailed 26% of the ballots but 50% of those returned were from people over 65.) Every year, Democrats and progressives gain as more ballots are counted.
California counts are always slow. As many as a fourth of the votes will not be counted before the weekend. Why? It is not due to fraud or incompetence. It is because in California, we value the right of eligible citizens to vote and value an accurate count more than speed.
In California, most votes are cast on paper ballots. Many counties used to use touch-screens but the state decertified them in 2007 due to concerns over security. Further, a large majority (70% or more) of ballots are usually cast absentee. Absentee ballots take longer to process because most mistakes are not found until the ballot envelope is opened. Because California law holds that a voter’s intent is to be honored, when a scanner cannot read a vote (for instance due to a tear or a marking not being sufficient for the scanner), a real person looks at it and tries to honor the voter’s intent if possible.
Absentee ballots may be delivered by mail, to an area ballot station (like a big mailbox), to a voting location, or be mailed. Voters can turn in an absentee ballot anywhere in the state until the time the polls close. Those ballots delivered away from the voter’s home are shipped to the voter’s county of residence where they must be verified before counted. Thus, late-delivered absentee ballots are counted late. Mailed votes are counted so long as they are postmarked by election day and are received by the Friday after the election. Thus, “new” votes will arrive after Tuesday.
Final counting is also slowed because absentee voters who have failed to sign the ballot envelope are contacted and allowed eight days (until the the Wednesday of the week after the election) to appear in person and sign.
In short, be patient. Breathe. As the days pass, click on “close races” on the Secretary of State’s web site for election results to keep up to date on the count. https://vote.sos.ca.gov/returns/close-contests
