As California continues to slowly count ballots, edging closer to determining who will advance in elections to run the state and its largest city, Donald Trump and other Republicans are spreading claims of election fraud that have become common after California elections.
Current Status of Key Races
On Monday, Trump-backed Republican Steve Hilton was inching closer to securing the second runoff spot in the California governor’s race, after Democrat Xavier Becerra secured the first spot on Friday. But the race has yet to be called for Hilton, with more than 2.5 million ballots still left to be counted across the state.
In the Los Angeles mayoral race, progressive city councillor Nithya Raman and reality TV star Spencer Pratt, a registered Republican, were in a close race to challenge incumbent mayor Karen Bass, who advanced to the runoff on election night. On Sunday, Raman began to lead in the election count as more mail-in ballots were tallied.
When Decision Desk HQ posted that it predicted Raman would win the second seat in LA’s mayoral runoff, Trump posted on Truth Social: “No way this could have happened. Rigged Election!” In a separate post, he added: “Two great Republican Candidates are being cheated.”
Who’s Spreading Election Fraud Conspiracy Theories?
Just days after the California primary, Trump began claiming without evidence that Democrats were cheating in the state’s election, and urging Americans to support the Save Act. On Thursday, Trump wrote in a social media 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 repeated such claims before walking out of an interview with NBC’s Meet the Press on Friday, and over the weekend.
Trump has a history of undermining election results that don’t go in his favor, most notably alleging that Democrats “stole” the 2020 presidential election, which he lost to Joe Biden. He’s repeatedly opposed mail-in ballots, a voting method favored by Democrats in recent elections.
Over the weekend, Trump’s preferred LA mayoral candidate Pratt hinted at similar election conspiracy theories in a social media post, writing, “They’re not the only ones who know where to find votes” and suggesting that Raman’s lead in the race came from votes from the entirety of LA’s unhoused population.
On Monday, tech billionaire Elon Musk joined the fray, reposting several tweets questioning the integrity of California’s elections, supporting the Save Act and alleging that recently counted votes in support of Raman were fraudulent. In a post, he wrote: “Once voting is this fraudulent, they can get whatever outcome they want, making a sham of democracy.”
Meanwhile, offline, Trump’s justice department sent a federal prosecutor to observe ballot counting in LA and the first assistant US attorney for the central district of California, Bill Essayli, announced his office had “multiple election fraud investigations under way” in coordination with the FBI’s Los Angeles office.
Is There Evidence of Voter Fraud?
No credible evidence of voter fraud has emerged in California. Essayli has even debunked some of the claims currently circulating about ballot manipulation, writing in a social media post: “There was a claim circulating on social media about an election night ballot update at the Los Angeles Registrar of Voters where one candidate received zero votes. We reviewed official county records. The claim is false.”
Voter fraud is incredibly rare in the United States. To create a database of 1,000 instances of voter fraud, the conservative Heritage Foundation, the organization behind Project 2025, “had to go back decades in time where there have been hundreds of millions of votes cast and a very small number of cases of election fraud have been found, none of which affected election outcomes,” according to the Brookings Institution.
Analyzing Heritage’s data, to give concrete examples, Brookings found that the percentage of fraudulent votes cast in Arizona was .0000845% and no election outcome there was altered by ballot fraud.
Why Does California Take So Long to Count Its Ballots?
California has long been among the slowest states when it comes to counting ballots. That’s because California has “the most accessible, secure and verifiable election system in the country”, said Kim Alexander of the California Voter Foundation, a nonpartisan voting rights group. Every voter in California receives a mail-in ballot, which most voters use to vote by mail. The signatures on those ballots are verified electronically and by human observers – and voters are given the opportunity to fix any errors within 22 days of the election. The system prevents the state from having to discard ballots with minor errors, but means it can easily take more than 22 days for California to count all votes.
“There’s not a lot of people I know who would say: ‘Nah, I would rather have known who won the race faster than have my vote count,’” Paul Mitchell, vice-president of the voter data firm Political Data Inc, told the Guardian. “The only people who complain about it are the people who lose.”
But Californians understand that the state’s slow pace can create space for misinformation to spread. “Time is of the essence in preventing election lies from taking hold,” governor Gavin Newsom warned in a letter that he sent to county election offices last month, urging them to speed up their counts. “We face an assault on our democratic values unlike anything we have seen in our lifetimes, and it’s our job to safeguard those values.”
Why Do Californians Wait So Long to Vote?
Another reason why California takes so long to call the results of its elections is because voters often wait until the last minute to cast their ballots. Many of these last-minute ballots are not counted until after election day. The state also accepts mail-in ballots that were postmarked on and before election day and received no later than a week after the election.
This year, with the California governor’s race hotly contested, many voters made the decision to mail in their ballots at the last minute – allowing them to make a strategic decision about who to vote for based on the most recent polling.
Are There Ways to Speed Up the Process?
Yes. Experts and lawmakers have called for investments in California’s elections and legislation that would shorten the window voters have to “cure” their ballots. If California invested more in statewide elections, to pay for the staff, equipment and office space to count ballots, it could see some of the same results that wealthier counties like Los Angeles and Orange have witnessed in recent years. In November 2022, Los Angeles had only counted 77% of its ballots one week after election day. But after funding a $10 million ballot processing facility, the county counted 96.9% of votes within the same time frame in 2024.
California has taken some steps to speed up the process, reducing the number of days voters have to “cure”, or correct errors on their ballots from 26 days to 22 last year. Some advocates are calling for the state legislature to reduce the window even more. And with many voters walking their mail-in ballots to polling sites, dozens of counties have started allowing voters to open their ballots and cast them directly at the polls - meaning their vote is counted that same day.
“It’s a great benefit for voters because they know their ballot has been counted,” said Alexander of the California Voter Foundation. “They can walk away with confidence.”
Did Nithya Raman Concede?
When Raman addressed supporters on election night, incumbent mayor Karen Bass was leading in the results. Early results showed Raman behind Pratt, and she gave a cautious and teary-eyed speech thanking her supporters. At no point in her address did she concede. “Tonight may not give us a final answer on this race. Many thousands of votes will be counted in the days ahead, and we may not get an answer we like. But regardless of what happens next, nobody, nobody can take away what all of us have built together,” Raman said. Even if Raman had conceded during her remarks, it would not have been legally binding.
Why Is Raman Gaining in Results Now?
Democratic candidates typically surge in the results later than their Republican competitors because Democratic voters usually favor ways of voting (like mailing in their ballots) that see their votes counted later. Since 2020 and the Covid-19 pandemic, Democrats have increasingly voted by mail. That year, 58% of Democrats voted by mail, compared to 29% of Republicans.
Will Newsom Block Pratt from Winning the LA Mayor’s Race?
Rumors that California governor Newsom will block Pratt from advancing in the LA mayor’s race have begun circulating on social media, citing Newsom saying he had a “break the glass” option for Pratt winning. In reality, Newsom told lawmakers he had a “break-the-glass” contingency plan to support at least one of the Democratic candidates in the state’s governor’s race if it looked likely that two Republicans were headed to the general election. Although he did not share details of the plan, it included rallying Democratic voters to go to the polls ahead of the primary rather than blocking a candidate from winning after the election.
