California's slow vote count faces changes as Supreme Court decision on late ballots looms
This is read by an automated voice.Please report any issues or inconsistencies here.
California’s slow vote counting process — still underway and causing friction after last week’s primary — may be forced to change before November’s midterm elections, as the U.S.Supreme Court prepares to rule on whether mail ballots must be received by election day to count.Whether those changes will speed things up — and help tamp down baseless claims from President Trump and others that the slow count is evidence of fraud — will depend on a variety of factors, election experts said, including how the high court rules, how state lawmakers and local elections officials respond, and whether they push any additional steps to quicken the count.“We’re all on the edge of our seats, waiting to see what the Supreme Court does,” said Kim Alexander, president of the California Voter Foundation.“We’re certainly planning for a bad Supreme Court decision in this case, but we don’t really know all of our options for how to respond until we see the court’s decision,” said Assemblymember Gail Pellerin (D-Santa Cruz), chair of the Assembly Elections Committee and a former top elections official in Santa Cruz County.Pellerin said she has been working on contingency plans with other state officials — including some from the offices of Gov.
Gavin Newsom, Secretary of State Shirley Weber and Atty.Gen.
Rob Bonta — and has requested $35 million in state funds to educate voters on any new midterm deadlines, though that funding has not been appropriated.Federal law has, since 1872, set “election day” as the first Tuesday following a Monday in November, and gives Congress oversight over elections for the president and members of Congress.However, most authority for running elections falls to the states.California currently provides a grace period for ballots to be counted as long as they are postmarked by and received within seven days of election day.
More than a d...