Election data that was provided by California state officials for last month’s primary elections show that more than 148,000 mail-in ballots were rejected, an uptick of more than 40,000 from the 2024 primary.
All in all, 148,241 were rejected in the state’s June 2 primary election, according to data released by the California Secretary of State’s office, which manages elections. The figure represents 1.73 percent of all mail-in ballots.
According to the data released earlier this month, more than 93,000 mail-in ballots were rejected by officials because they arrived too late. Another 8,300 were rejected because there was no voter signature on the ballot, and nearly 44,000 were rejected due to a non-matching signature.
Meanwhile, some 580 weren’t used because no photo ID was provided, more than 740 were rejected because the voter had already voted, around 640 were rejected because the ballot was missing from the envelope, and roughly 450 were flagged as having multiple ballots in each envelope, the election figures show.
The data provided by the office did not list the rejected ballots by party registration.
The rejection rates varied by county, with Tulare County having the highest rate at 3.52 percent. Alpine and Merced counties saw 3.36 percent rejection rates, according to the data. The lowest was reported in Placer County, with a 0.93 percent rejection rate.
Los Angeles County, the county with the highest population and most voters, reported a 1.34 percent rejection rate, while San Diego County saw a 1.37 percent rate, the figures show.
The 2026 primary rejection figures are up from the 2024 primary, when 108,982 mail ballots were tossed, representing a 1.56 percent increase, according to the California Secretary of State’s office.
Kim Alexander, the head of the California Voter Foundation, told media outlets this week that ballot rejections during the primary election last month were largely due to them being mailed too late.
“Ballots rejected due to lateness are caused primarily to being postmarked too late to count, not because they arrived too late to count,” Alexander told The Associated Press.
Following last month’s primary, President Donald Trump criticized California’s election system. At one point, he questioned results showing Los Angeles mayoral candidate Spencer Pratt falling to third place behind two Democrats.
“Not possible for Spencer Pratt to have lost the L.A. runoffs after the big lead he had,” Trump wrote on social media at the time. “Rigged Elections!”
California Gov. Gavin Newsom’s office has sought to counter claims made by Trump that elections are being mismanaged in the state, including a post issued on X last week.
“California law is clear: You MUST be a U.S. citizen to vote state and federal elections,” the post said. “Voter fraud is EXTREMELY RARE—and almost always committed by U.S. citizens.”
On Thursday, Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.) and Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers called on the U.S. Postal Service to address delays in the state in April.
“Hundreds of absentee ballots received by the Postal Service before Wisconsin’s Spring Election were delivered after Election Day, preventing them from being counted,” the two Democrats wrote to U.S. Postmaster General David Steiner.
The California Secretary of State’s office did not respond to a request for comment on Friday.
