‘Election month’ is California’s delay by design

The Golden State keeps telling voters patience is the price of accuracy. Florida proves secure elections do not have to take a month.

“Accuracy comes before speed.” That was California’s Secretary of State Shirley Weber’s message to voters in a press release issued two days after they started counting votes from June’s primary. In the same release, she reminds voters the vote counting could continue for up to 30 days after Election Day.

Weber argued that California is “taking the time to do this work correctly, protects voters’ rights and ensures the integrity of our elections.”

I mean, she is right about one thing. Accuracy does matter.

Every lawful ballot should be counted. Every voter should have the confidence election officials will get it right.

A week after Election Day, California is still processing 1.7 million ballots under a system that routinely extends counting days and sometimes weeks beyond when voters cast their votes.

That raises a question to which California’s leaders seem increasingly unwilling to give a good answer:  Why are voters repeatedly being told they must choose between accurate elections and timely election results?

This is not the first time California has found themselves in this mess.

Back in 2022, several California congressional races remained unresolved long after Election Day while control of the U.S. House hung in limbo. Fast forward two years later, California took 38 days to certify its election results. Now in 2026, Californians are once again waiting days after Election Day for final results.

The details change. The outcomes do not. Californians keep waiting.

So why does this keep happening?

Current reporting suggests the answer starts with California election laws.

According to CalMatters, “The delay is due in part to ways California has endeavored to make it easier to vote since the COVID-19 pandemic: Every registered voter gets a mail-in ballot, and ballots are valid as long as they’re postmarked by Election Day and arrive at county elections offices within seven days of the election.”

Election law expert Hans von Spakovsky highlighted how the state’s vote count is not the result of an “isolated incident or unexpected complication,” but the way the state’s election system is designed.

In other words, California is not experiencing an unexpected delay.

It is experiencing the results of the election laws it chose to adopt.

Gov. Gavin Newsom helped cement those policies back in 2021 when he signed AB 37, making California’s universal vote by mail permanent.

Newsom’s office promoted the measure as “landmark elections legislation” that would both expand vote by mail and strengthen election integrity.

Yet, Californians are being sold on the “idea” that waiting days for election results is simply the reality of modern elections.

It’s not. It is the reality of California elections.

You know what’s part of election integrity? Timely election results.

The longer ballots remain uncounted, the longer election officials must maintain a secure chain of custody, ballot verification system, and storage.

If California leaders want faster results, they should be willing to examine the policies contributing to slower ones.

Instead voters are routinely told these delays are simply the unavoidable reality of administering elections in a large state. The explanation falls apart under examination.

Take a look at Florida. The 2000 presidential election exposed weaknesses in the state’s election system. As a result, Florida lawmakers spent years reforming election administration and ballot processing procedures.

Today, Florida is one of the fastest states in the country to report election results.

The Sunshine State allows election officials to begin processing votes by mail ballots before Election Day, giving counties a head start on verification. Florida also requires most mail ballots to be received by Election Day rather than days afterward. Voters whose signatures are missing or do not match generally have a much shorter window to correct those issues than California voters.

Florida proves that accuracy and speed are not mutually exclusive.

California is clearly choosing a different approach.

This is way more about administrative efficiency. In five months, Californians are going to return to the polls again for the midterm election. Voters deserve confidence the election results will be accurate. They also deserve confidence that their results will be timely.

Lawmakers must examine if ballots should continue arriving after Election Day and still be counted. They should review whether lengthy ballot curing timelines are helping voters or simply extending uncertainty. Election officials should also be given every opportunity to process ballots before Election Day so results can be reported faster once polls close.

Most importantly, California leaders should stop pretending accuracy and speed do not go hand in hand.

Florida proves they are not.

Secretary Weber says accuracy comes before speed. California voters should ask “why can’t we have both?”

Because after 2022, 2024, and this year’s primary election, this no longer looks like a glitch but a pattern stemming from poor policy choices.

California built a process that can take a month after Election Day to resolve.

Voters should stop accepting it as normal.