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This story has been updated to correct information about the timing of when election results will come out. A correction was also made to reflect that county elections offices will contact voters whose ballot envelope signatures do not match those on file.
Today is the last day to vote on California’s special election Proposition 50. The measure would temporarily redraw the state’s congressional maps to favor Democrats in five key districts, bypassing California’s independent redistricting committee.
The measure is a reaction to state lawmakers in Texas reworking their own congressional district lines to give Republicans more power in Congress.
Once residents cast their ballots, what happens next? CapRadio talked to county elections officials and experts to better understand when we’ll know the results after the last of voters get in line for the polls at 8 p.m.
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Typically, results are released in three waves on election night after the polls close.
The first batch of results will be viewable for each county in the state on the California Secretary of State website. This will show preliminary results and will be updated daily around 5 p.m. until December 12, when the results must be certified.
Sacramento County Spokesperson Ken Casparis told CapRadio that the first report for how Sacramento county residents vote will generally come around 8:15 p.m. This will be predominantly reflective of the mail-in ballots received before election day.
“ The first report out is mostly just what we've collected so far on election day,” he said. “It doesn't include all of the ballots that come to us after the vote centers are closed.”
After that, the next wave will be at 10 p.m. with results from ballots cast at vote centers counted on election day, according to the county’s website. Subsequent updates should arrive every two hours.
The third wave of results comes from mail ballots dropped off at voting sites in-person on election day, said Kim Alexander, president of the California Voter Foundation. She calls this the “pig in the python” effect. It’s a labor-intensive process that requires county elections staff to remove the ballots from their envelopes, verify voter signatures and ultimately scan and count each ballot.
“The big wave that will come after that are the vote-by-mail ballots that were returned on election day or that arrive by U.S. mail on the seven-day grace period and are postmarked by election day,” Alexander said. “So that can be up to 20% to 25% of all the ballots cast in a county.”
In California, voters are contacted by their elections office if the signature on the outside of their ballot envelope does not match the one on file, or if there’s missing or incorrect information. Voters are provided with several ways to submit a new signature to ensure their ballot is counted. (Full Story)