California Democrats want faster election results, but say any decision hurts voters

California’s slow vote count has drawn national attention in the days since the June 2 primary — raising familiar questions about what can be done to speed up the count. And while both state Democrats and Republicans say they would like the results to be finalized more quickly, Democratic leaders are unlikely to implement major changes if it means disenfranchisement in the process.

As CalMatters’ Maya S. Miller explains, it took about a week for enough ballots to be counted to declare the California governor’s race. During this time, the counting of the votes drew criticism President Donald Trumpthe popular election data analyst Nate Silver and New York Times” editorial board, which argued that California’s lagging results “damage faith in government.”

State Democratic leaders say that because the slow count is mostly due to the large volume of mail-in ballots that come in on Election Day or the day before, speeding up the count could make voting more difficult for some Californians.

• Assemblywoman Gail PellerinSanta Cruz Democrat, chairman of the election commission and former county clerk: “If you want election night results, you’re going to have to go back to in-person voting, much earlier mail-in deadlines, and you’re going to end up disenfranchising voters.”

California Secretary of State Shirley Weber also dismissed concerns about slow rollback as a Trump theme: “To me, accuracy is much more important,” Weber told CalMatters in April.

Voting by mail also takes more time, labor and money to process than voting in person. But California counties aren’t getting enough funding to pay for more workers, according to the Public Policy Institute of California. Unlike some other states, California also does not contribute ongoing funds to election districts.

• Eric McGeesenior associate at PPIC, regarding county recorders: “They’re doing the best they can with the budget they have. But it’s a lot to handle.”

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A major California labor union and lawmakers are introducing two separate tax proposals to offset sweeping federal Medicaid cuts that congressional Republicans approved through their 2025 spending bill and Trump signed into law.

The first proposal, backed by the state’s largest health care workers’ union, qualified for the November election last week. It would impose a one-time 5 percent tax on the state’s billionaires, which supporters say would generate $100 billion for the state. Gov. Gavin Newsom, health industry groups and California’s wealthy tech executives oppose the measure. The California Teachers Association is also pushing back, introducing its own ballot initiative to make permanent an existing surtax on wealthy Californians.

A second proposal approved by the Legislature would restructure the state tax on managed care organizations in a way that would shift more costs for privately insured Californians. One health insurance lobby estimated that the change could result in consumers paying about $100 more in premiums each year.

Read more about billionaire tax and MCO tax suggestions by Kristen Hwang and Ana B. Ibarra of CalMatters, respectively.

A bill that would bar Cal State University from replacing faculty with generative artificial intelligence tools underscores growing tensions between the university system and its faculty Cal State’s use of AIwrites Mikhail Zinstein of CalMatters.

While there are several examples of the state of California’s attempts to replace teaching jobs with artificial intelligence, the technology’s role more broadly has raised fears among members of the California Teachers Association, the professors’ union supporting the bill.

In 2025, the union filed an unfair labor practices complaint against Sacramento State, accusing its then-chief AI officer, Alexander Sidorkin, of soliciting teachers for their teaching materials “in order to get a customized AI learning bot for their classes.” The union also alleges Sidorkin created a mental health chatbot for students and linked the bot to a resource webpage. California state officials denied this.

The union eventually withdrew its complaint after Cal State and the union settled the overall matter in March. Sidorkin, who didn’t know he was named in the complaint until contacted by CalMatters, said he never created the bot. Rather, he wanted to recommend that students use ChatGPT during a mental health episode if counselors are not available.

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To get the proposed legislation out of the Assembly, Assemblywoman Blanca Pacheco watered down a controversial bill that would have reduced access to public records. Now the Downey Democrat has brought back the controversial elements and they are more restrictive than before. It’s a “virtual horror show of government opacity,” one transparency advocate said of Pacheco’s measure. Read more by Yue Stella Yu at CalMatters.