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A particularly competitive 2022 US House race in California’s Central Valley took three weeks to call, with the result coming down to a few hundred votes. <\/p>\n
Two years later, State Senator Laura Richardson waited 17 days to be declared the winner in a highly competitive race in South Los Angeles. <\/p>\n
That same year, an unprecedented tie for second place in Northern California forced a recount that took nearly two months to resolve. <\/p>\n
California \u2013 and especially Los Angeles County \u2013 are notorious for slow election counts. But Tuesday’s primaries could test the patience of even the most savvy political junkies as some of the highest-profile races, including California governor and L.A. mayor, remain tight.<\/p>\n
“We’re trying to keep people calm,” said Tracy Hernandez, chief executive of . New California Coalition<\/a>A non-partisan group that works on policy solutions. “Expect not to know.”<\/p>\n Experts who spoke to the Times say the outcome of some of the most publicized and close contests probably won’t be clear until Tuesday night, although many races could be declared by then. Most estimate that the runoff candidates for California governor and L.A. mayor are unlikely to be confirmed until Wednesday or Thursday, although there are several factors that could drag out the process even longer.<\/p>\n Primaries in California identify the top two vote-getters in each race \u2013 regardless of party preference \u2013 who advance to the November general election. <\/p>\n The lengthy vote count in California is largely the result of the state having multiple ways for voters to cast ballots, which election officials say expands access and participation \u2014 but increases the time it takes at the back end of that process to verify and verify ballots. <\/p>\n In particular, the expansion and popularity of universal vote-by-mail has led to more steps being taken to count and verify ballots. Unlike in-person voting, where verification occurs beforehand, mail-in ballots must be inspected and signatures verified. If the signature of a voter is missing or doesn’t match<\/a> California law requires election officials to notify that voter and give them an opportunity to fix the problem, which could also delay the process, according to the signatures on file.<\/p>\n Ballots are also accepted for up to seven days after an election if they are postmarked on or before Election Day, so in extremely close races, it may take several days to receive all relevant ballots. <\/p>\n But election monitors are universally clear that although results are slow to come in, it does not inherently point to a problem or fraud \u2013 in fact, they say the opposite. <\/p>\n “We give people so many different ways to vote, and as a result it takes longer to count all the votes,” said Jessica Levinson, a law professor at Loyola Marymount University. “And that’s the way it should be… This is an argument in favor of making sure the process goes smoothly \u2013 not quickly.”<\/p>\n \u201cThis is healthy,\u201d Hernandez said, \u201cand will result in more Californians being able to vote.\u201d<\/p>\n LA County is known for its exceptionally slow election results, but experts say that’s simply because of how many ballots it handles. <\/p>\n “There is no entity, no vote counting (system) anywhere in the country that is counting more votes and more elections than L.A. County,” said Fernando Guerra, founding director of Loyola Marymount University’s Center for the Study of Los Angeles.<\/p>\n But in addition to the systemic factors that slow down election results in California and L.A. County each year, this primary season has seen pressure against early voting and high rates of undecided voters, which is expected to cause further delays in how ballots are cast and, therefore, received and verified. <\/p>\n Those voting patterns could also distort the results of the first batch of election results, which county registrars will begin sharing just hours after the polls close at 8 p.m. Tuesday. The first tranche typically includes ballots received before Election Day, vote-by-mail ballots and ballots received from early voting locations, and then votes cast on Election Day. <\/p>\n This year, those first results will probably be more conservative \u2014 despite California’s strong liberal leanings \u2014 because of the Democratic Party’s message to wait to vote because of concerns about the too broad field of gubernatorial candidates, said Zev Yaroslavsky, director of the Los Angeles Initiative at UCLA Luskin and a former county supervisor. <\/p>\n He pointed to the last L.A. mayoral election, in which late voters and mailed-in ballots initially showed developer Rick Caruso in the lead over Mayor Karen Bass, before counting began. After watching the results for about 24 hours, Caruso conceded the race to Bass on Wednesday night.<\/p>\n \u201cWe need to acknowledge that the first ballots counted are not always the most representative,\u201d Levinson said.<\/p>\n There is no concrete timeline for when the races will be called. <\/p>\n The Associated Press has become the gold standard for announcing election results \u2013 the Times typically relies on its expertise \u2013 and such announcements usually come well before all the votes have been counted. But the news agency does so only when it is “fully confident that a race has been won \u2013 most simply defined as the moment when the trailing candidates no longer have a path to victory,” according to For an article about its process<\/a>. <\/p>\n Several experts who spoke to the Times said there’s a good chance the runoff candidates for governor and L.A. mayor won’t be confirmed by the end of Tuesday night, even if there is a clear contender.<\/p>\n \u201cIt could be a very frustrating disappointment of a night,\u201d Levinson said. “It’s entirely possible that we’re looking at days, not hours.”<\/p>\n Technically, local election officials have 30 days to process and certify all ballots, although it rarely takes that much time to declare a winner.<\/p>\n However, there is a growing emphasis on expediting election results \u2013 without reducing voting options or security. Support from Governor Gavin Newsom<\/a> And several at the state capitol. Last year, legislators passed a new law that requires a vote tabulated till day 13<\/a> After the ballots close, however, this does not change the 30-day deadline for official results and provides several exceptions. <\/p>\n “We have access, accuracy, security \u2014 now the challenge is to maintain all those values \u200b\u200bwhile accelerating the count,” said Kim Alexander, who heads the nonpartisan organization. California Voter Foundation.<\/a><\/p>\nWhat takes so long?<\/h2>\n
So… when will we know?<\/h2>\n